48 



Fishes. 



formed plates, tliat diminish in size and increase in number towards the head, and 

 which are separated like the pieces of a dissected map, by deep sutures. They all pre- 

 sent the tnberculated surface. The eyes are placed in front, on a prominence much 

 lower than the roof-like ridge of the back ; the mouth seems to have opened, as in ma- 

 ny fishes, in the edge of the creature's snout, where a line running along the back 

 would bisect a line running along the belly, but this part is less perfectly shown by my 

 specimens than any other. The two arms or paddles are placed so far forward as to 

 give the body a disproportionate and decapitated appearance. From the shoulder to 

 the elbow, if I may employ the terms, there is a swelling muscular appearance, as in 

 the human arm; the part below is flattened so as to resemble the blade of an oar, and 

 it terminates in a strong sharp point. The tail — the one leg on which, as exhibited 

 in one of ray specimens, the creature seems to stand — is of considerable length, more 

 than equal to a third of the entire ligure, and of an angular form, the base represent- 

 ing the part attached to the body, and the apex its termination. It was covered with 

 small tnberculated rhomboidal plates like scales ; and where the internal structure is 

 shown, there are appearances of a vertcb rated bone, with rib-like processes standing 

 out at a sharp angle." — p 73. 



a. Coccosteus cuspidatus. b. Part of its tail. r. An abdominal lozenge-shaped plate of the same fish. 



Closely allied to Ptcriclithys is the genus Coccosteus ; "both were 



