39 



body and tail flat, with a very slightly raised central ridge. Pec- 

 toral and dorsal fin distinct. Caudal fin none, or very rudimentary. 

 Egg-pouch ? ; none apparent in the specimen. 



HaLIICHTHYS TjENIOPHORA. 



The head compressed, spinose, with a high, arched, central ridge 

 armed with spines, each having an elongated slender filiform beard 

 in front of its base ; the eye-brows produced, crested, with two large 

 curved spines on the upper edge ; the front spine furnished with a 

 very long filiform beard on the front edge ; the lower edge of the 

 orbit with two spines, the base of the operculum with one, and the 

 upper edge with a prominent ridge armed with two unequal spines, 

 the hinder one largest and compressed. The head at the back edge 

 of the operculum with an arched ridge armed with four large com- 

 pressed conical spines ; and there is a compressed bifid one on the 

 nape between these two arched ridges. Body hexangular, or sub- 

 heptangular from the obscure ventral keel, formed of nineteen rings ; 

 the lower lateral angles are narrower than the rest, which are sub- 

 equal ; each plate of the rings is armed with a subcentral spine ; and 

 the spines on the three or four darker rings of the body are furnished 

 with elongated filiform beards. The tail is quadrangular ; the under 

 side is rather the widest and flat, the others are concave ; each 

 shield is furnished with a spine like those of the body, and the 

 greater part of the spines are furnished with a filiform elongated 

 beard. Caudal rings about forty-five, the apical one obscure. 

 Dorsal fin over the vent 26-rayed. 



The dry fish is black above, pale beneath, with thi'ee distant black 

 spots on each side of the body, and distant black cross bands on the 

 under side of the base of the tail. 



Hab. Freycinet harbour. Shark's Bay, W. Australia. 



Mr. Gould read the following extract from a Letter addressed to 

 him by George Bennett, Esq., of Sydney, dated October 15th, 



1858:— 



" The semipalmated Goose, I have seen domesticated in Sydney in 

 a poultrv-yard, having been hatched by a common hen. This bird 

 in its anatomy evidently approaches the Cranes, and in habits also. 

 Especially when you see it running about the poultry-yard, it re- 

 sembles one of the Gruidce more than a Goose. The bird I allude 

 to was one of many hatched under a hen from eggs procured from 

 the blacks at a station on the Mooruya River, near Broulee, south 

 of Sydney. Ten eggs were procured and placed under two hens, 

 five for each, and in three days less than a month produced seven 

 young Geese, which were reared by the foster-mother. The eggs 

 are said to be cream-coloured, not larger than a small-sized goose- 

 egg. The birds lay their eggs close to the water in the lagoons i 

 they commence to lay about September. The bird was an adult, and 

 diifered materially from your drawing, which I consider to represent 



