4 oo SPINY-FINNED GROUP, 



A fossil species of grey mullet has been described from the upper Eocene of 

 Provence, and an extinct genus from the Cretaceous. Our figure represents the 

 common grey mullet (M. capita), one of several species frequenting the British 

 coasts. Although this mullet only grows to a weight of about 4 lbs., some of 

 the foreign species may scale three times as much. This mullet has been 

 kept in a fresh- water pond, where it seemed to thrive better than in the sea. 

 The flesh of all the grey mullets is of good quality, but bears no comparison 

 to that of their red namesakes. 



Gar-Pike and Flying-Fish,— Family Hcombrexocidje. 



In this place may be noticed a family in regard to the serial position of which 

 there is some difference of opinion, Dr. Gunther placing it among the tube-bladdered 

 fishes, while Professor Cope considers that its true position is here. The inclusion 

 of the group among the tube-bladdered fishes utterly spoils the definition of that 

 suborder, since in those members of the present family provided with an air- 

 bladder that organ lacks a duct. It is true that the fins of the flying-fishes and their 

 allies are less spiny than those of the more typical representatives of the suborder 

 under consideration, but, as we have seen, this character is one of but slight 

 morphological value. Agreeing with the preceding section in the abdominal 

 position of the pelvic fins, these fishes differ from those yet described, with the 

 exception of certain perches, in the union of the lower pharyngeal bones : while 

 they are further characterised by the absence of a spinal dorsal fin, and the 

 deeply forked caudal. The single dorsal is situated opposite to the anal fin in the 

 caudal region, the air-bladder is generally present, the false gills are hidden and 

 glandular, and the simple stomach merely forms a dilatation of the intestinal tract. 

 Although the majority of the members of this family are marine, some being 

 pelagic, a few have taken to a fresh- water existence ; and while many of the latter 

 are viviparous, the whole of the others deposit eggs in the usual manner. Dis- 

 tributed over all the temperate and tropical seas, these fish are strictly carnivorous 

 in their habits. Geologically, the family is a comparatively ancient one, the gar- 

 pike being represented by an extinct species in the Sicilian Miocene, and by an 

 allied extinct genus in the Eocene of Monte Bolca, while a fish nearly allied to the 

 living flying-fishes occurs in the Cretaceous rocks of the Lebanon. 



In North America it appears that the name " gar-pike " is applied 

 indifferently to a member of the present family, and to the very 

 distinct fish also known as the bony pike ; but in scientific nomenclature it will be 

 better to confine the term to the members of the present genus. Gar-pike are 

 represented by nearly fifty species from temperate and tropical seas, among which 

 the figured one (Belone vulgaris) is common on the British coasts, likewise ranging 

 over the whole of the seas of Northern Europe. As a genus, these fishes are 

 easily recognised by the production of the jaws into a long slender beak, formed in 

 the upper one exclusively by the premaxillary bones ; while they are further 

 characterised by the whole of the rays of the dorsal and anal fins being connected 

 by membrane. The beak is, however, only developed in the adult, very young 

 specimens having the jaws of normal form ; and it is not a little remarkable that 



