PISCES 247 
HEMEROCGTES MICROPS sp. nov. 
Plate LIV., fig. 2. 
The specimens below described were not taken by the trawler, 
nor within the sphere of its operations; they were caught by 
myself on a hand line in the various Sounds on the south-west 
coast, and present several differences from what I have con- 
sidered or have chosen to consider as typical of H. acanthor- 
hynchus: the principal features in which the specimens differ 
may be expressed as follows :— 
DPa20R eA. 30: 
Length of head 3.7, height of body 10.4, and length of caudal 
5.6 in the total: diameter of eye 4.5 and length of snout 2.5 in 
the head. 
Compared with H. acanthorhynchus, the head is larger, while 
the eye is very much smaller, both vertically and horizontally, so 
that the interorbital space is wider and the snout much longer; 
in the older species the eye and the snout are of almost equal 
length, but in H. microps the eye is but half the length of the 
snout; there is a prominent knob above the tip of the upper jaw. 
Fins.—The vertical fins are very much higher than in the type 
species, the dorsal being more than a third higher than the body: 
the lunate caudal, when compared with Richardson’s figure, 
would also appear to be different, but the shape is really 
determined by the degree to which the outer rays are produced, 
a feature which may depend upon age, sex or other condition. 
Colours.—The once brilliant colouration has quite disappeared 
in preservative, the general disposition of the markings alone 
remaining. The upper part of the head and the body above the 
lateral line are brown, the underparts are colourless; a blue lne 
from below the preorbital spine, passes backwards beneath the 
eye, there are some oblique bars on the cheeks and opercles: and 
seven dark brown bars across the upper half of the back, the first 
being in advance of the dorsal fin and the last behind it on the 
eaudal peduncle: all the fins are smoky; the dorsal has three 
darker horizontal lines. 
Length.—217 mm. 
The brilliant colouration and striking markings of this fish 
excited the interest of all who saw it alive, but not recognising 
it as different from the specimens previously trawled, and of 
which I had made careful colour sketches—since lost—I did not 
take note of its characters. 
Presuming that the specimen described and figured by 
Richardson is co-specifie with Forster’s examples, I have given a 
