168 THE NATURALIST IN AUSTRALIA. 
The Tassel fishes, Polynemide, constitute one of the leading groups of economic 
value indigenous to Australian waters, though in this instance most abundantly 
represented in the essentially tropical rivers and estuaries. The distinguishing features 
of the most characteristic species of the single genus, Polynemus, is the almost salmon- 
like contour of their shapely bodies, correlated with which is the peculiar free style- 
like or filamentous character of a certain number of the rays of the pectoral fins. 
The most highly esteemed esculent species, Polynemus tetradactylus, is distinguished in 
the northern districts of Queensland and Western Australia with reference to its shape 
as the northern salmon. As its technical name implies, its free pectoral rays are 
only four in number, and these do not exceed in length the adjacent membrane- 
united rays. In the majority of other known species there are five free pectoral, and 
in one small but new form discovered by the writer in the Ord river, Western Australia, 
in association with the surveying expedition (1888) of H.M.S. “ Myrmidon,” there are 
seven such rays, four of which may extend backwards beyond the extremity of the very 
elongate lobes of the caudal fin. By way of compliment to Captain the Hon. H. P. 
Foley Vereker, in command of the above-named vessel, as whose guest the writer 
first visited Cambridge Gulf, the name of Polynemus Verekert has been conferred 
upon this species.* This phenomenal fish not having been previously figured, 
except in diagrammatic outline, its aspect as drawn and coloured from life is 
herewith reproduced in monochrome. 
W’, Saville-Kent, del. 
SEVEN-RAYED TASSEL FISH, Polynemus Verekeri, ORD RIVER, CAMBRIDGE GULP, W.A. NATURAL SIZE. 
f 
The life tints of this newly discovered species are very distinctive, the ground 
colour being a prominent chrome yellow with darker shadings, the pectoral and 
* Proc. Royal Soc., Queensland. Vol. VI. part V., 1889. 
