274 Transactions.— Zoology. 
Synnema.* Gen. nov. 
Uranoscopus, Cuv. au Val. Anema, Giinth., II., 230. Kathetosioma, 
Hutton, 23. 
Habit and teeth of Uranoscopus ; scales very small; a filament in the 
interior of the mouth ; one continuous dorsal ; ventrals jugular ; pectoral rays 
branched ; some bones of the head armed—six branchiostegals ; pseudo- 
branchiz. 
Synnema monopterygium, mihi. 
Anema 3 Günther. 
Kathetostoma ,, Hutton. 
This species since the days of Solander and Forster has undergone several 
changes in its nomenclature, the latest being that proposed by Capt. Hutton, 
because he finds a filament in the mouth, so that the generic name of Anema 
of Giinther (without filament) would be quite inappropriate. The species 
cannot again be united with Uranoscopus, as it possesses one dorsal only, while 
it cannot be placed with Kathetostoma, as Capt. Hutton has proposed, because 
the three spines on the inferior margin of the preoperculum, the two on the 
mandibula and two on the throat, which form amongst others a very important 
character of that species, are absent in the genus under review. 
The Canterbury Museum possesses two specimens of this curious genus, of 
which one (11 in. 6 lines long) was caught in the river Avgn, near Christ- 
church, and the other (15 in. long) in the river Rangitata, about forty miles 
above its mouth, by Mr. W. Packe, who presented it to the Museum. 
This species, as far as the specimens in the Canterbury Museum are 
concerned, is fluviatile in its habits, but I suppose that it inhabits both salt 
and fresh water periodically. 
I may also here observe that at least some of this tribe, which all bury in 
the sands or mud lying there in wait for their food passing over their mouth, 
can remain above low-water mark during the ebbing of the sea, as one of my 
sons when digging for shells in the sands on the beach near the Sumner Hotel 
not far below high-water mark came upon a specimen about 15 in. long. It 
was carried by him to a pool of water with a sandy bottom, but the fish 
disappeared in an incredibly short space of time, having buried itself in the 
sands. 
KATHETOSTOMA GIGANTEUM. sp. nov. 
The Canterbury Museum received from Mr. Day, in Sumner, a very large 
specimen of cat-fish, caught in the Heathcote estuary, near Sumner, which 
upon examination proved new to science, 
This magnificent specimen, which, as far as I could ascertain, is the largest 
* From syn with, and nema filament. 
