LYCODOIDS. 125 



ANACANTHINI. 



LYCODOIDS. 



As determined heretofore the horizontal distribution of this group has in- 

 cluded both sides of the north Atlantic to the Arctic ocean, the northeastern 

 portion of the Pacific, and the region about Magellan's straits. Outside of . 

 these a single specimen has been secured, " said to have been received from 

 Japan," belonging to a new species and a new genus the closest allies of 

 which occur off the western coasts of North America. The fact that the " Chal- 

 lenger " expedition found none of the group in either the western Pacific 

 or in the Indian Ocean, and that the extensive researches of the " Investi- 

 gator" have discovered none in the northern reaches of the Indian Ocean 

 suggest either an absence or great rarity of these fishes in those waters. 

 The material on which the present report is based contains twelve species, 

 of seven genera, from the depths eastward and northward from the Gala- 

 pagos Islands toward Central America and Mexico. A statement was re- 

 cently made by Collett concerning the genus Lycodes, several species of 

 which were shown by the investigations of the " Travailleur " and the "Tal- 

 isman " to occur at great depths near the equator in the eastern Atlantic, to 

 the effect that '• in all probability this genus is spread throughout from Pole 

 to Pole, in suitable depths where a uniform [low] temperature prevails." 

 So far as concerns Lycodes this is no longer to be classed as a probability, 

 but rather as an established fact; and furthermore there, are reasons for 

 making similar statements relating to the genera Maj'uea, Lycodopsis, Phu- 

 cocoetes and L3codapus, all of which are now at hand from the equ.atorial 

 portions of the eastern Pacific, though previously reported only from the far 

 north or from the far south. The occurrence here of these genera indicates 

 a probability of the presence of representatives of all or nearly all the genera 

 of the entire group in the equatorial regions, or in other words in the great 

 depths from the Arctic to the Antarctic Ocean. The required temperature 

 is not stated by Collett, but from the evidence in the collection it ranges, for 

 the group, from 35.8 to 42 degrees Fahrenheit, or, including that of previous 

 expeditions of the steamer '• Albatross," in the Pacific, from 35. 8 to -45 de- 

 grees, among deep sea forms, though probably reaching somewhat higher 

 among shoal water species and lower toward the poles. Knowledge of the 



