'736 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



teeth; wrist and pectoral fin slender; ventrals elongated; soft 

 dorsal and anal, vertically expanded. Small fishes of fantastic 

 shape in the West Indies and Gulf Stream. 



370 Pterophryne histrio (Linnaeus) 



Mousefish 



LopMus histrio Linnaeus, Syst. Nat. ed. X, I, 237, 1758. 



CMronectes laevigutns Storer, Rep. Fish. Mass. 73, 1839; De Kay, N. Y. 



Fauna, Fishes, 165, pi. 27, lig\ 83, 1842. 

 Antennarius histrio Jordan «& Gilbert, Bull. 16, U. S. Nat. Mus. 846, 1883. 

 Pterophryne histrio Gill, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. 216, 1878; Goode & Bean, 



Oceanic Ichth. 486, 1896; Bean, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist. IX, 373, 



1897; H. M. Smith, Bull. U. S. F. C. 1897, 109, 1898; Jordan & Ever- 



MANN, Bull. 47, U. S. Nat. Mus. Ill, 2716, 1898. 



The length of the body is one and four fifths times its depth 

 and two and one fourth times the length of the head; skin of 

 head and body, as well as dorsal fins, with fleshy tags, which 

 are most numerous on the dorsal spines and abdomen; wrist 

 slender; ventrals large, nearly half as long as head; dorsal and 

 anal with posterior rays not adnate to the caudal peduncle. 

 D. III-14; A. 7; V. 5. 



Yellowish, marbled with brown; three dark bands radiating 

 from eye; vertical fins barred with brown; belly and sides with 

 small white sp^ots. Tropical parts of Atlantic; abundant on our 

 Gulf coast and occasional northward. 



The mousefish inhabits the tropical parts of the Atlantic. 

 It is abundant on our Gulf coast and occasional northward to 

 Oape Cod, specially in floating masses of Sargassum. It was 

 once taken in Europe in floating seaweed, from the Gulf 

 Stream, and has been recorded from the coast of Senegambia. 



De Kay described this species under the name of the smooth 

 mousefish. He refers to the descriptions of Cuvier and Valen- 

 ciennes, and Storer. He states that the geographic range of 

 the species at that time was known to extend from Charleston 

 to Boston. 



This species is not uncommon in summer in floating masses of 

 gulf weed brought near our shores by the Gulf Stream and other 

 currents. An example was caught off the ocean shore of Long 



