LUMPENUS. 
227 
are inserted below and between the bases of the pec- 
toral fins, in older specimens farther forward. The spi- 
nous ray measures about 1 / 3 of the length of the fin; 
and of the three soft rays the innermost is the longest, 
its length diminishing with age from 5 to 3 % of that 
of the body. The distance between the ventral fins and 
the beginnino- of the anal fin varies between 25 and 
24 % of the length of the body. The first rays of the 
long dorsal fin are small, but thick, and gradually in- 
crease in length to the 11th or 12th ray, from which 
point the fin is of uniform height, measuring about 2 / 3 
of the greatest depth of the body, back to about the 
40th ray, and then very gradually diminishes in height. 
It begins almost in a line with the tip of the opercular 
flap, and is united by its membrane to the base of the 
caudal fin. The spinous ray of the anal fin is about 
half as long as the soft ray immediately behind it. 
At the beginning, to about the 5th ray, this fin also 
increases in height, and then becomes straight and of 
the same height as the dorsal fin, ending in a line with 
the termination of the latter, and united in the same 
way to the base of the caudal fin. The caudal fin 
grows more and more pointed with age. Its length is 
generally about 10 or 11 % of that of the body, but, 
according to Stuwitz, may rise as high as 14 %, and 
thus be nearly half as long again as the head". 
The colouring of the body in the living fish, ac- 
cording to Fries, is superiorly pale brownish, shading 
into blue, with irregular, grayish brown spots, dotted 
with a darker colour, and uniting into indistinct, oblique, 
transverse bands. The lower part of the body is lighter 
and without spots, shading in front into blue and behind 
into greenish yellow. A row of about nine oblong, 
brownish spots follows the lateral line, which is tinged 
with yellow. The head of the same colour as the body, 
but without spots. Gill- cover bright green and yellow. 
Iris brass-coloured with a silvery lustre, but this patch 
of colour is very narrow superiorly, as a wide strip of 
the eye is here brownish black. Dorsal fin pale, with 
transparent membrane, in certain lights with a hand- 
some bluish lustre, and striped with about 12 wavy, pale 
brown bands, sloping in a posterior direction. Pectoral 
fins with yellowish rays, and with this exception pale 
and without spots, like the ventral and anal fins. 
Caudal fin with 6 indistinct bands — in young spe- 
cimens only 3 or 4 — of pale brown spots on the 
yellowish rays. 
Pyloric appendages only two, but fairly large. 
Ovaries united, but in front distinct from each other. 
In the females we find a small anal papilla, which seems 
to be prominent, however, only during the spawning- 
season. 
The Sharp-tailed Lumpenus has been found on the 
coast of Bohuskin on only few occasions, first by B. 
Fries, who in January, 1837, in the outer part of Gull- 
maren, took a female 190 mm. long in a seine. Since 
that time Malm has recorded two captures of this spe- 
cies in the south of Bohuslan; and in May, 1880, Mr. 
C. A. Hansson found a specimen 154 mm. long in the 
gullet of a Gadus morrliua from the neighbourhood of 
Stromstad. Almost at the same time as Fries, Stuwitz 
and Esmark discovered the species in Christiania Fjord. 
It is of more common occurrence on the west coast of 
Norway, where it had already been remarked by Strom; 
and it seems to be most numerous in the extreme north, 
in Finmark, in which district it was obtained by Lill- 
jeborg in 1848. As early as 1786 it was described 
and figured by Mohr as an Icelandic species. It occurs 
in Spitzbergen too, up to 80° N., according to Collett; 
and it is stated to occur in Greenland by Reinhardt 
and Kroyer. Thus it is really an arctic species, but 
also lives in the Baltic, where it Avas first, observed by 
Mr. G. von Yiilen, Avho in 1861 sent to the Royal 
Museum tAvo females, respectively 230 and 274 mm. 
long, which had been taken in Bravik. Brenner has 
subsequently recorded its capture in the summer of 
1871, off Hogland in the Gulf of Finland; and M obi us 
and Heincke have received a specimen 25 cm. long, 
taken Avith a Herring-net in Kiel Harbour on the 22nd 
of November, 1877. Finally Day has added this spe- 
cies to the fauna of Scotland by his description of a 
specimen Avhich Avas taken on the 31st. of May, 1884, 
in a trawl, at a depth of 40 fathoms, 15 miles off St. 
Abb’s Head. 
With regard to its habits nothing is knoAvn, save 
that it is generally taken in the seine, and therefore in 
comparatively shallow water and near the coast. The 
specimen taken by Fries had evidently just deposited 
its spaAvn; and the spawning-season thus seems to oc- 
cur during the Avinter * * 6 . (Fries, Smitt.) 
a Day gives a figure and description of a singularly-shaped caudal fin in a male of this species, the five middle rays (though perfect) 
being considerably shorter than the outer ones on each side. 
6 “ Vid jultiden ” (at Christmas), says Nilsson, not “im Juli" (Mob., Hcke). 
