POKOGADUS LONGICEPS. 153 



Porogadus longiceps sp. n. 

 Plate F,fig.2; Plate LXXVI. Ji>/. 1, Lat. Si/st. 



Br. r. 8; D. 183-184; A. 149-152; V. 2; P. 20 ; C. G. 



The specimen described has a length of eighteen inches. Compressed, 

 elongate, very slender in the caudal portion, depth throe fourths of the 

 head. Head one sixth of the total length ; parietal region llattcned, with 

 a pronounced angle at each side ; snout long, two and one half times the 

 length of the eye, widened opposite the posterior nostrils, and rounded 

 from this point forwards. In aa iippor view the head bears some resem- 

 blance to that of Esox. The skull has a strono- median internarial ridsre 

 and backward of this on the interorbital space there are two short keels. 

 The opercular spine is prominent and strong ; the spines on the pre- 

 opercular region, those at each side of the parietals, and the group imme- 

 diately behind each posterior nostril are very small. On larger specimens 

 the spines are more reduced ; on smaller ones, again, they are com- 

 paratively much more developed. Small individuals have two series of 

 preopercular spines, an anterior of three and a posterior behind the 

 mucous cavities of six smaller ones on the hind edge of the preoperculum. 

 Seen from the side the head is pointed, the depth at the end of the snout 

 being little. Mouth very wide ; maxillary extending backward more 

 than half the length of the head, one diameter of the orbit farther than 

 the eye, its width at the end equal the length of the orbit. Teeth small, 

 equal, in villiform bands on jaws, vomer, palatines, basibranchials, and 

 pharyngeals. Vomerine band narrow, V-shaped, with apex forward and 

 arms curving outwaixl. Tongue rudimentary. Eye small, two fifths as 

 long as the snout, one half of the interorbital space, and about one 

 eighth as long as the head. Gills four, a short slit behind the fourth ; 

 rakers slender, close together, four, three of which are rudiments, on 

 the upper branch of the first arch, and eighteen, five or six being rudi- 

 ments, on the lower. On the older specimens the rakers deteriorate 

 and become club shaped or otherwise deformed. Pseudobranchiae small. 

 Pyloric ca^ca tliree, rudi^lentar3^ Vertical fins continuous around the 

 tail ; dorsal origin above the axil of the pectoral ; anal origin to snout 

 one third of the total length, first anal ray below the twenty-seventh 

 ray of the dorsal; caudal very small, slender, longer than the orbit, 

 pointed, extending bej'ond the ends of dorsal and anal raj's. Pectoral 



