SCANDINAVIAN FISHES. 
latter". The long, pointed caudal lobes are the result 
of considerable changes due to age, but sometimes seem, 
according to Lutken’s figure (1. c., tab. IV, fig. 1), 
to be formed at an early period 6 . The changes of age 
as well as individual peculiarities cause remarkable va- 
riations in the dental equipment of the mouth. A young 
specimen, 56 mm. long, has in the upper jaw an outer 
row of large teeth, and inside this in the back part 
one row and in front two irregular rows of smaller 
teeth; in the lower jaw there are two pairs of large 
canine teeth in front, belonging to the inner row, which 
throughout is made up of larger teeth than the outer; 
on each palatine bone is a row of small teeth, but the 
vomer is without teeth. Lunel has, however, remarked 
(1. c., pp. 171 and 172) the irregularity of the occur- 
rence of the teeth on the vomer and the occasional 
shedding of the jaw-teeth, which leaves only the outer 
row in each jaw. The spines at the margin of the 
preoperculum still exist in specimens 56 mm. in length, 
where 12 of them may lie counted, though they are 
indistinct. 
The differences between the scales on different 
parts of the body are highly remarkable. The snout, 
the anterior part of the forehead, the intermaxillaries, 
and the margin of the hind lower corner of the pre- 
operculum are the only scaleless parts of the body. 
In younger specimens the boundary of the scaly part 
of the head begins vertically above the posterior 
third of the eye and runs fairly straight down the 
sides, but in older specimens it begins above the 
anterior orbital margin and on the sides of the head 
runs obliquely downwards and backwards to the hind 
upper part of the orbital margin. Winther c has 
pointed out the resemblance to the Sparidce in the pores 
which pierce the scaleless skin, and he also refers to 
the same system of sensory organs (the system of the 
lateral line) the pores in the scales which occur in this 
species as in Pterycombus (see fig. 20 above). The 
distribution of the different kinds of scales is also es- 
sentially the same as in the latter species; but in Ray’s 
Bream the lateral line, which from the upper corner 
of the gill-opening roughly follows the curve of the 
back, forms, at least in the anterior part of the body, 
a well defined boundary between the smaller and more 
rounded scales of the back and the higher (broader) 
scales of the lower parts of the body. The former are 
in old specimens smooth and perfectly cycloid, but in 
younger specimens the radiating striations on these 
scales, as Lutken^ remarks, are granular or even spi- 
nous and give the scales a ctenoid character. On the 
lower (broader) scales Lilljeborg* was the first to 
remark the spine in the middle of each scale, which 
disappears with age. In our smallest specimen (fig. 23) 
these spines are especially distinct on the lower parts 
of the ventral sides proper, and between the ventral fins 
and the vent they make the ventral edge dentated as 
in the Sprat. In older specimens, where the spines 
have disappeared, the scaly covering of the belly and 
the pectoral (shoulder-) region is remarkable for its 
closer resemblance to the scales of the back and head, 
and by this contrast to the covering of the other lateral 
parts reminds us in some way of the corslet of the 
true Scombridce. 
Owing to these differences between the scales of 
the body, we have above omitted, in the usual fin and 
scale formula, to give the number of scales in the la- 
teral line. In our smallest specimen we find 61 trans- 
verse rows of dorsal scales and about 50 in a straight 
line below the lateral line; in an older specimen 90 
transverse rows of dorsal scales, and above the lateral 
line, counting obliquely downwards from the beginning 
of the dorsal fin, 14 scales in one of these rows, below 
the lateral line 16, thus making in all 31 longitudinal 
rows of scales. 
The colouring of the body is brownish with a 
silver or tin-white gloss; but the dorsal edge and the 
membrane of the vertical fins where it is free from 
scales at the margin, are blacker, the caudal fin, 
however, being edged with white at the hind mar- 
gin. To judge by v. Wright’s drawing of a fresh 
specimen the black colouring also extends over the 
snout and branches sideways along the depression 
a In the smaller specimen mentioned above, the length of the pectoral fins is almost 30 % of the length of the body and of the 
ventral almost 12 °/\ in the larger specimen these proportions are respectively 33 °/ and 8 %. 
b In the smaller specimen mentioned above, the length of the middle caudal rays is about 42 / of that of the longest ones, and the 
fin is thus much less deeply forked than in Lutken’s figure, the original of which, however, was younger or at least smaller, while in our 
larger specimen mentioned above, the length of the middle rays is only 18 % of that of the longest. 
c Zool. Dan., 1. c. 
d 1. c., p. 495. 
e Om Pterycombus brama, 1. c.: — cf. also Lutken, 1. c., pp. 495 and 496. 
