414 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [voL. 48 
mostly lateral, although somewhat directed upwards; the mouth is 
very oblique; the branchial apertures are continuous below, the 
branchiostegal membrane being very deeply cleft, only confluent in ° 
Fic. 122.—Greater weever (Trachinus draco). After Smitt. 
front of the pelvis, and not bridged over by any fold; each oper- 
culum is armed above with a channeled spine directed backwards 
and connected with a special gland; the dorsal furniture is uni- 
formly constituted by an anterior short fin with six or seven spines 
(the largest spines being channelled somewhat like the opercular 
ones), and a very long posterior rayed fin; the anal is also very 
long and the anus consequently in the breast; the pectoral fins have 
moderately wide but not procurrent bases, and the ventral are ap- 
proximated, jugular, and have each a spine and five branched rays. 
The range of variation within the family is much less than in 
the Uranoscopids or Batrachoidoids, the species so closely resembling 
each other that by all naturalists except one (Bleeker) they have 
been united in a single genus. Notwithstanding the superficial uni- 
formity, however, some differences are manifest which are rarely 
developed in genera otherwise closely related; such are the differ- 
ences in dentition and in the character of the lips. In the great 
weever (Trachinus draco) there are distinct pterygoid teeth, the 
lips are simple, and the cheeks and opercles scaly, while in the 
lesser weever (Echitichthys vipera) there are no pterygoid teeth, 
the lips are fimbriated, and the cheeks and opercles naked. In- 
asmuch as Smitt (1892) denies fimbriated lips (“lips without 
fringes”) to the entire family Trachinide, this exception is espe- 
cially noteworthy." 
*As the characters here given (and by Bleeker in 1861) are contradictory 
of statements given in highly esteemed European works, explanation may 
properly be demanded. According to Day (1880), Trachinus vipera, like T. 
draco, had teeth “villiform in jaws, vomer, ; alatines, and peterygoid bones.” 
I have in vain searched the Lesser Weever for pterygoid teeth, as have also 
Prof. Gilbert and others. According to Smitt, all Trachinids have “lips 
without fringes” (p. 127), and this statement is uncontradicted in his notice 
