ACANTHOPTERYGII. 217 



rally furnished with a membranous appendage; the jaws are covered 

 with fleshy lips; there are three pharyngeals, two upper ones attached 

 to the cranium, and a large lower one, all three armed with teeth, 

 now resembljng a pavement and then pointed or laminiform, but 

 generally stronger than usual. 



Labrus, Lin. 

 A very numerous genus of fishes which strongly resemble each other in 

 their oblong form; their double fleshy lips, from which, they derive their 

 name, one adliering immediately to the jaws and the other to the suborbi- 

 tals; their crowded branchiae with five rays; their conical maxillary teeth, 

 the middle and anterior of which are the longest, and their cylindrical and 

 blunt pharyngeal teeth arranged like a pavement, the upper ones on two 

 large plates, the lower on a single one which corresponds to the two others. 

 Our Blackfish or Tautog is a true Labrus. This genus is divided into nine 

 subgenera, differing in the teeth, mouth, &c. &,c The most remarkable 

 is the 



Ebibuxtjs, Cuv. 



Remarkable for the excessive protractility of their mouth, which by a 

 see-saw motion of their maxillaries, and the sliding forwards of their inter- 

 maxillaries, instantly becomes a kind of tube. They employ this artifice to 

 capture the small fry which pass within reach of this singular instrument. 



But a single species is known; Spams insidiator, Pal., of a reddish co- 

 lour. From the Indian Ocean. 



Chromis, Cuv. 

 The lips, protractile intermaxillaries, pharyngeals, dorsal filaments, and 

 port of a Labrus; but the teeth of the pharynx and jaws resemble those of 

 a card, and there is a range of conical ones in front. The vertical fins are 

 filamentous, those of the belly being even frequently extended into long 

 threads; the lateral line is interrupted. 



C. vulgaris. The common or black Coracinus of the ancients. A small 

 chesnut-brown fish, taken by thousands in the Mediterranean. 



ScARUs, Lin. 

 A genus of fishes with remarkable jaws (that is, their intermaxillary and 

 premandibular bones), whichare convex, rounded, and furnished with teeth, 

 arranged like scales upon then- edge, and upon their anterior surface; these 

 teeth succeed each other from behind, forwards, so that those of the base 

 are the newest, and in time form a row on the edge. They have the ob- 

 long form of a Labrus, large scales, and an interrupted lateral line; they 

 have three pharyngeal plates, two above and one below, furnished with 

 teeth as in a Labrus; but these teeth are transverse blades, and not like 

 rounded paving stones. 

 2 C 



