SCYLLIUM AFRICANUM.— Auct. 



Pisces.— Plate XXV. Fig. 1. (Female.) 



S. superne purpureo-griseum, nigro-purpureo tinctura et fasciis nigro brunneis longitudinalibus septem 

 variegatum, quarum tribus e nasi apice incepientibus ; cirris brevibus, ante marginem labii superioris 

 desinentibus. 



Squalus Africantjs, Lin., 1494. 20. 



Squalus Vittatus, Shaw, Nat. Misc. PI. 346. 



Squale Galonne, Lseeep. 1. 254. 



Scyllium Africantjm, Cuv. Reg. Animal, 2. 386. 



Colour. — The upper and lateral parts of the head, the back, and the sides, 

 lavender- purple, tinted with a colour intermediate between blackish purple 

 and brownish purple red. The back and sides are, in addition to the tints 

 just specified, further variegated with seven longitudinal blackish brown 

 stripes generally single, but sometimes, as in the specimen represented, 

 double; three of the stripes originate at the apex of the snout, one at 

 each eye, and one immediately behind the last branchial opening. The fins 

 are of the same colour as the back, the tint towards their base a little darker. 

 The under parts are pale brownish purple red, slightly clouded, especially 

 towards the throat and base of pectoral fins, with vermilion red. Eyes light 

 reddish orange, with a bronze lustre. 



Form. — Head and anterior portion of body robust, posterior portion 

 slender ; the back anteriorly broad and slightly convex, posteriorly com- 

 pressed and subcarinated. Eyes directly over the angles of the mouth ; the 

 temporal spiracle is rather large, almost circular, and situated a little behind 

 and below the posterior junction of the eyelids. Snout rather narrow, and 

 its apex rounded. Nostrils large, and immediately in front of the upper lip ; 

 the external half of each oblique, the internal half transverse, and the one 

 portion is divided from the other by the cirrus, which originates from 

 the anterior edge of the nostrils, extends across the opening, and terminates 

 considerably anterior to the edge of the upper lip. Besides the regular 

 cirrus, there is at its base externally a sort of rudimentary one, consisting of a 

 slightly triangular elongation of a portion of the anterior edge of each nostril. 



