CODFISHES. 
539 
natural system for this purpose. From Cuba, St. He- 
lena, Madeira, and New Zealand we have Physiculus, 
without vomerine teeth and with more numerous rays 
in the ventral fins than Pliycis, though their number 
varies between 7 and 3. Uraleptus, from the Medi- 
terranean and Madeira, is a Physiculus with canine teeth 
set in a row outside the smaller jaw-teeth. Halopor- 
phyrus, which occurs in the Mediterranean and the 
Atlantic, from Portugal down to the Southern Hemi- 
sphere, is a Pliycis with reduced number of rays in 
the first dorsal fin. Antimora, from the Southern Hemi- 
sphere and the Atlantic south of Newfoundland, is a 
Haloporphyrus with elongated snout, a character which 
it possesses in common with the majority of the Ma- 
cruridce, and with the anal fin almost divided into two 
sections, a point which reminds us of Merlucius. Thus 
the Phycis type is extremely variable. 
The history of the fry approximates Phycis to the 
following genus". Young specimens about 30 — 35 mm. 
long (fig. 129) are of a silvery, Mackerel-like colour, 
resembling the fry of the Roc.klings. The four or three 
rays of the long ventral fins are united by a broad, 
black-pigmented membrane, as in the fry of the Ling. 
Fig. 129. Young specimen of Phycis blennoides , natural size. 
After Facciola. II Naturalista Siciliano, Anno II (1882), p. 27. 
The scaly covering of Phycis is variable, but al- 
ways better developed than in the preceding genera of 
this family. The concentric striae (raised ridges) of the 
scales are finely but unevenly crenulated, and for the 
most part run parallel to each other, most of them (the 
outer ones) extending to the margin of the scale both 
in front and behind, which is the case in front with 
all of them. The nucleus, which lies near the hind 
extremity of the scale, is extremely narrow and elong- 
ated, and is continued forward in a groove to the ex- 
treme front margin of the scale, only the inner con- 
centric striae being thus continuous behind the nucleus. 
a Lutken, Vid. Meddel. Naturh. Forh. Kbhvn 1881, p. 252; 
p. 296, tab. VIII, figs. 2 and 3; Facciola, II Naturalista Siciliano, A 
1 Bull. Mus. Comp. Zoo!., Harv. Coll., vol. X, p. 204. 
c Ann. Mus. D’Hist. Nat. Paris, XIV (1809), pp. 193 and 19 
d Om Lydorganer hos Fislce, p. 156, tab. IV, fig. 59. 
e De Pise., Lib. VI, cap. X, p. 186. 
f De Anim. Lib. VIII, cap. XXX. 
9 Gen. Pise., p. 84; Syn. Pise., p. 111. Hence the Blennius 
h Syst. Iclith., p. 56. 
1 11, if we include Lcemonema. 
Round the latter we also find either an irregular net- 
work of fine striae at the hind part of the scale, or a 
trace of this network in the form of fine transverse 
striae between the concentric ones. In Pliycis the lateral 
line also runs over true scales, not, as in the preceding 
genera of this family, with its pores opening in the 
bare skin. The fine grooves radiating towards the 
anterior margin are more distinct and more numerous 
in the scales of the lateral line than in the others. 
In one species of this genus ( Phycis regius ) Alex- 
ander Agassiz, according to Biiown-Goode and Bean*, 
has observed a faculty of giving electric shocks, though 
according to these writers this power is possessed by the 
species only when it lives in very deep water. Special 
electric organs, however, have not been detected, and 
the electric sensation may probably be explained by 
the vibration caused in the entire body of the fish by 
the violent contraction of the large muscles. 
Delaroche c and Sorensen' 7 have described the 
air-bladder of Phycis mediterraneus. It is divided by 
two transverse contractions into three parts, internally 
communicating with each other, the first of which 
projects at the top into a pair of lateral horns attached 
to the upper end of each of the clavicular bones, and 
is furnished with a pair of transverse muscles at the 
anterior part of its wall, one on each side. From this 
structure Sorensen concludes that in Phycis mediter- 
raneus the air-bladder is an organ of sound. 
Rondelet* was the first to give this genus its name, 
for in Aristotle 7 <pvAg was certainly some other fish : 
“the only marine fish of which if is stated that it makes 
a bed in which to give birth to its young.” The name 
was introduced into the modern nomenclature of science 
by ArtedY and Bloch-Schneider/'. The Swedish name 
of Bartel fish (Beard-fish) was bestowed upon the genus 
by Fries in the first edition of this work (p. 77). 
The genus contains seven species', five of which 
belong to the Mediterranean and the European side of 
the Atlantic. The Scandinavian fauna contains only 
one of them. 
assiz, Young Osseous Fishes, Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts, Sc., vol. XVII, 
io II (1882), p. 25; Emery, Mitth. Zool. Stat. Neapel, Bd. 6, p. 159. 
Phycis of Linnzeus, Syst. Nat., ed. XII, tom. 1, p. 442. 
