96 



NORTHERN ZOOLOGY. 



[45.] 2. Anarrhichas minor. (Olafsen.) Lesser Wolf-fish. 



" Hlyre (A. minor). Oi.apsens og Bjarne, fyc. Ann. 1772, p. 592, t. xlii.'' 

 Anarrhichas minor. Fabkicius. Faun. Groenl., p. 139. 

 Kcerrak. Greenlanders. 



This species was seen in Greenland, and described by the Missionary Glahn in 

 the year 1766, but it did not come under the notice of Fabricius. Its teeth are 

 said to be different from those of the preceding species in form and arrangement, 

 and to have a more cartilaginous texture. The fish was first described and figured 

 by Olafsen, in the account of his voyage to Iceland. 



Fins.— D. 70 ; P. 20 ; A. 44 ; C. 21. {Fauna Groenl) 



Gobius. (Linn.) Fish belonging to this genus may be recognised at first 

 sight by the union of their thoracic ventrals, either along their whole length, or 

 merely at their bases, so as to form a single, hollow, and more or less funnel-shaped 

 disk. Their gill-flaps, furnished with five rays only, are generally only slightly 

 open, and, like the blennies, they can live for some time out of the water ; they 

 resemble these fish likewise in the structure of the intestines, the presence of the 

 same little protuberance behind the anus, and in some of the species being vivi- 

 parous. They are fish of a small or middle size, which live among rocks near the 

 shore. Most of them have a simple air-bladder. 



There are several sub-genera. Gobius (Lacep.) or the true Gobies, have the ventrals most 

 completely united, the disk extending even before their bases, where it is margined by a trans- 

 verse membrane. The species are numerous, many inhabiting the seas of Europe, and some 

 even the fresh waters. Olivi, who studied the manners of one which inhabits the lagoons of 

 Venice, observed that it preferred a clayey bottom, in which it excavated tunnels for its winter 

 retreats. In the spring it selected a place abounding with fuci for its nest, and covering it with 

 the roots of the Zostera maritima, he male shut himself up therein to wait for the females, 

 who came in succession to deposit their roe which he fecundates, watches, and defends 

 courageously. From these facts Cuvier judges this goby to be the phycis of the ancients, the 

 only fish, says Aristotle, which constructs a nest. G. bosc (Lac^pede) inhabits the bay of 

 New York *. 



The' Gobioides of Lacepede differ from the true gobies in the union of the dorsals into a 



* It is the Gobius ahpidotus, Schneider, BL, and the G. viridi-pallidus, Mitchiij.. New York Tr., p. 379, pi. 1, f. 8. 



