OF THE BRITISH ISLANDS. 17 



ostegal rays five to seven in number ; air-bladder present 

 or absent. 



The so-called " Norway Haddock," or Bergylt {Sebastes 

 norwegicus), No. 18, a fish of Bream-like aspect, but 

 differing from the members of the group last described in 

 the spinous armature of the pre-operculum and other head- 

 bones, and in the feeble, villous character of the dentition, is 

 our only indigenous example of the Scorpoenida. It is a 

 northern deep-water fish, not uncommon off the coasts of 

 Norway, Greenland, and among the Faroe Islands, but 

 becoming rare further south. Full-grown specimens of this 

 type are said to attain to a length of no less than four feet ; 

 the example, about eighteen inches long, exhibited in the 

 Day Collection, was captured by the Hull fishermen in 

 March of the present year, 1883. The colour of this fish 

 when living is a bright vermilion or carmine red, becoming 

 lighter towards the ventral region. Although but sparingly 

 represented in British waters, the exotic species of the 

 Scorpoenidce are exceedingly numerous, widely distributed, 

 and wonderfully diverse. Thus, while our indigenous 

 Sebastes more nearly simulates a Bream in both form and 

 habits, the typical genus Scorpcena includes some forty 

 tropical or sub-tropical species, that more closely resemble 

 in some respects the Cottidce, or Bullheads, and in others, 

 the Anglers, or Pedkulati, being devoid of an air-bladder, and 

 leading like them a sedentary life at the bottom of the 

 ocean. Many of them, in a similar manner, have their 

 skins wonderfully marbled or mottled, and are commonly 

 adorned in the region of the head with simple or variously 

 branched membranous appendages. In Ckoi'ismodactylus 

 again, which in other respects agrees closely with Scorpcena, 

 the three anterior rays of the pectoral fins are freely movable, 

 and so constructed that the fish is enabled with their aid to 



C 



