A COLLECTION OF FLSHES FROM SUMATRA. 531 



jaws. Vomer with a long fang in center, and several small teeth about. Palatines 

 with a single series of a few enlarged teeth, similar to those along sides of mandible. 

 Tongue rather long, narrow and free. Lips rather broad and somewhat fleshy. 

 Anterior nostril with a short bifid tube. Posterior rather large, circular, level with 

 upper rim and nearly opposite front rim of orbit. Interorbital space broad and 

 flattened. Opercle with a narrow fleshy gill-flap. Top of head broad and more or 

 less flattened, becoming convex posteriorly. 



Gill-opening large, extending forward till about an eye-diameter posterior to 

 posterior rim of orbit, and branchiostegal membrane forming a broad fold over isth- 

 mus. Gill-rakers small, short broad asperous stumps, and 7 in number on first arch. 

 Gill-filaments short. Accessory branchial cavity large, and with a large fleshy valve. 



Scales moderately large, cycloid, those on bases of caudal and pectoral fins small. 

 On head above, and opercular region, scales become bony and firmly joined to top 

 of head. Lateral line slighth" oblique at first, then dropping down a scale over 

 third anal ray and extending straight to base of caudal. 



Dorsal fin of nearly uniform height, long, and beginning over posterior margin 

 of gill-opening. Anal beginning about midway between tip of snout and base of 

 caudal, similar to dorsal in size and shape. Caudal oblong, its posterior margin 

 convex. Pectoral rounded, middle rays longest. Ventrals small, inserted well 

 behind pectorals, and reaching anus. Caudal peduncle deep and compressed. 



Color in arrack more or less brown, dark or dusky above, and lower surface 

 whitish or soiled-brown. Trunk more or less mottled or blotched with blackish- 

 brown. A pale streak along side from opercle, and below this four or five large 

 blackish blotches. Opercle with a blackish blotch. A dark streak from eye above 

 obliquely across opercle, and another similar one from lower margin of eye. Fins 

 all more or less dusky, with obliquely horizontal blackish lines on dorsal and anal 

 in front, becoming more or less parallel with fin posteriorly. Caudal with indistinct 

 blackish mottlings. Pectoral with four or five vertical cross-bars of blackish. Ven- 

 trals mottled with dusky. Peritoneum silvery. 



Length ll^ inches. 



Type No. 27,664, A. N. S. P. Padang. 



One example. This species is close to Ophicepliahis pleurophthalvtus Bleeker,' 

 differing however in color. Sides without the large ocelli of that species, but about 

 six large dark blotches below lateral line, like those in Bleeker's figure of O. ludus} 

 Pectoral barred, in this case agreeing with O. polylepis Bleeker,-^ but that species is 

 said to have longitudinal dark bands or lines on dorsal and anal, and sides without 

 dark blotches. O. urophthalnms Bleeker^ is probably the same as O. pleuroph- 

 thalmus from Borneo. 



{Spiritalis, belonging to air or breath. Applied as Ophicephalus is said to live 

 in mud-pools and rise to the surface before it becomes sun-baked to take in air at times.) 



' Nat. Tijds. Ned. Ind., I, 1850, p. 270. 

 ' Atlas Ichth., VIII, 1877, plate 398 (2), %. 1. 

 ' Nat. Tijds. Ned. Ind., Ill, 18.52, p. 678. 

 ♦ L. c. 



