FAMILY PERCID.E. 39 



GENUS SPHYR^NA. Cuvier. 



Body elongated, with ttoo distant dorsals. Lowei- jaw longest ; both with long teeth. Ven- 

 trals post-pectoral, or placed towards the 7niddle of the body. 



Obs. The fishes included xinder this genus have long been arranged under the family 

 Esocidae, and indeed their general form and habits would lead one to associate them with the 

 Pikes. They are, however, true Acanthopterygians, or fishes with bony rays ; have two 

 dorsal fins, and the intermaxillaries extend over the entire edge of the upper jaw. They 

 have also numerous csecal appendages, and their ventral fins are abdominal. Cuvier, in liis 

 last great work, places them at the end of the Percidas, from which, however, they must be 

 separated, as he observes, together with Paralepis and Polynemus, by a considerable interval. 

 These three genera will, in all probability, form a distinct family. Most of the species of 

 the genus Sphyraena, at certain seasons, are very poisonous ; producing, when taken as food, 

 vomiting and convulsions, and sometimes terminating in death. 



THE NORTHERN BARRACUTA. 



SpBR£NA BOREILIS. 

 PLATE LX. FIG. 196. — (STATE COLLECTION.) 



Characteristics. Small. Greenish above ; lateral line yellow. Opercle with a single point. 

 Length eight inches. 



Description. Bod)"- elongated, subcylindrical. Depth one-eighth of the total length. Scales 

 very small, adherent, orbicular, with minute concentric striae ; and under a strong lens, radiat- 

 ing striae may be observed : they extend over the opercular bones. The course of the lateral 

 line is very slightly sinuous, but nearly straight, and is manifested by a series of rather large 

 scales, under the posterior edges of which are short tubes. Head produced, flattened, smooth, 

 channelled above, rather more than one-fourth of the total length. Opercle large, emarginate, 

 opposite to the base of the pectorals, pointed above and rounded beneath. Eyes large, oval, 

 ■ 4 in diameter, and about a diameter apart. Lower jaw longest, and furnished at the tip 

 with a fleshy process. Teeth acute, pellucid, conspicuous on both jaws. In the lower jaw 

 they are large, distant behind, and becoming smaller and more crowded towards the front, 

 where two very large teeth are placed, and received into a cavity in the upper jaw. There 

 are also two large incurved teeth in the upper jaw on each side, and numerous minute teeth 

 along the edges of the intermaxillaries. Three long and slender teeth on the palatines of each 

 side, and beyond them numerous minute teeth. On the tongue, also, are numerous recurved 

 teeth. 



The first dorsal fin commences at a point equidistant between the lip of the pectorals and 

 the base of the ventrals ; it is obscurely triangular, its height equal to its base, and composed 



