240 



NORTHERN ZOOLOGY. 



The following is Mr. Gray's notice of the species : — 



" Lepisosteus Huronensis. Jaws elongate, slender, with a series of close, small, acute 

 teeth on the outer edge, and a row of rather distant, larger, elongated, conical, acute teeth, 

 just within their edge, and within them there is a narrow band of very short, small, velvet-like 

 teeth, which is contracted to a single series in front. Middle of the palate minutely granular 

 behind, with smaller velvet-like teeth in front. Head and operculum granular. Body pale 

 yellowish (under the epidermis white), with some large black spots on the tail and caudal fin. 

 Scales rhombic, smooth, with a sub-central, longitudinal convexity, which is sometimes pro- 

 duced into a very slight descending process at the hinder part of the lower edge, the margins 

 entire, the lower edge arched. The vertebral series rather larger, generally sub-cordate, with 

 a slight central groove and a posterior nolch. Lateral line rather indistinct. The first ray of 

 all the fins and sides of the tail furnished with a series of elongated, sub-cylindrical scales, 

 their acute, spine-like tips rather recurved." — " This species is allied to Lepisosteus osseus, 

 Bloch, t. 390, and to a new species which M. Agassiz has lately described from two spe- 

 cimens in the collection of the British Museum, under the name of Lepisosteus gracilis (Proc. 

 Zool. Soc, 1834), in the form of the beak, and is intermediate between them in the slender- 

 ness and comparative length of that part, as the following measurements will show. 







L. osseus. 



L. Huron. 



L. yracili 







Inches. 



Inches, 



Inches 



" Length 



of the whole fish 



. 35| 



28 



11 



jj 



upper jaw 



6| 



4| 



2| 



>j 



head . 



. 11 



n 



H 



» 



lower jaw 



7 



5 



2| 



j» 



from tip of nose to front of ventrals 



. 18| 



13£ 



5| 



„ 



,, anal . 



27 



20J 



H 



jj 



„ dorsal 



. 28A 



21* 



8* 



" Lepisosteus Huronensis differs from the other two in the scales being quite smooth ; while 

 in L. osseus the scales of the front of the body are slightly radiately grooved, and their edges 

 are crenulated ; and in L. gracilis the disk of the scales is rather granulated, their margin 

 smooth and entire. It also differs from both these, and from all the other known species of 

 the genus, in being spotted. The three long-nosed species are easily distinguished from each 

 other by their dentition, for L. gracilis has a series of long, rather distant teeth on the roof of 

 the mouth, on each side, within the two thin velvet-like bands. L. osseus, on the contrary, 

 has no such rows in that place, but. the whole hinder part of the roof of the mouth is covered 

 with rather large, short, conical teeth behind the two marginal velvet-like bands." J. E. 

 Gray, in lit. 



