FOUR-BEARDED ROCKLING. 
547 
The coloration on the back is a more or less dark, 
reddish brown (blackish brown, according to Lilljeborg; 
brownish gray, according to Kroyer), growing lighter 
and lighter down the sides towards the white belly, 
which is finely punctated with brown. As shown in 
our figure, irregular clouded spots of brown also occur 
on the sides of the tail. On the sides, and still more 
distinctly on the snout, the head shades into blue, more 
and more closely approximating to the colour of the 
cavity of the mouth. The first ray of the first dorsal 
fin is blackish blue. The other vertical fins are for the 
most part grayish blue or ash-gray, the margin of the 
second dorsal fin, the hind margin of the caudal fin, 
and the anterior part of the margin of the anal fin 
shading into yellow or red. All these fins are marked 
with bluish black, in a manner that strongly reminds 
us of the coloration of the corresponding parts of the 
body in Molua dipterygia. This is the case with the 
black spot at the ends of the second dorsal and the anal 
fins — the most persistent chromatic character in spe- 
cimens preserved in spirits — and the black colour of 
the upper and lower margins of the caudal fin also call 
to mind Molaa dipterygia. The coloration of the pec- 
toral fins, consisting principally of bluish black, suggests 
the same comparison, though these fins are grayish blue 
at the base. The ventral fins are also grayish blue. 
The iris is silvery white, with a brassy lustre. 
The abdominal cavity is short in comparison with 
that of the Cods. It terminates posteriorly in a line 
with the beginning of the anal fin. The peritoneum is 
black. The liver lies almost entirely on the left side, 
and does not extend further back than to about the 
middle of the abdominal cavity or to the beginning of 
the last third thereof, while the bottom of the stomach 
lies at about the middle of the cavity. The pyloric part 
is almost cylindrical, and runs in a forward direction, 
a little in front of the bottom of the stomach, on the 
lower side of the latter. It is sharply contracted in front 
and furnished there, at its termination, with 7 — 9 com- 
paratively large appendages. The intestine runs first 
forward almost to the diaphragm, then back to the hind 
extremity of the abdominal cavity, again forward within 
the first coil, and finally back to the anal aperture. 
The spleen is of a, three-sided, prismatic form, and is 
situated behind the bottom of the stomach. The urinary 
bladder is long and often lies in angular curves. The 
testes are divided into lobes, as in the Cods, and the 
ovaries of normal structure. The air-bladder is pointed 
in front, and extends along the posterior two-thirds" 
of the upper wall of the abdominal cavity. 
Such is the appearance of the Four-Bearded Rock- 
ling in its. adult state. Its earlier ( Concilia) stage was 
first observed by Thomas Edward off Banff, and de- 
scribed by Couch (1. c.). The specimen was 41 mm. 
long, more elongated than the young of other species 
of the same size, and had longer and more pointed 
pectoral and ventral fins. The unpaired barbel was 
considerably longer than the nasal ones. The dorsal side 
was of a handsome, deep green colour, or the back itself 
yellow, with a narrow stripe of purplish blue bounding 
it from the lustrous, silvery white colour of the sides. 
These young specimens have subsequently been found at 
the surface of the sea by Mobius and Heincke off 
Heligoland. 
The Four-Bearded Rockling was originally known 
only as a Swedish species and from the Sound. Schnei- 
der gives as its geographical range the Atlantic and 
(rarely) the Baltic. Kroyer obtained it from Lyngen 
Fjord in Norwegian Finmark, Malmgren .from ( )x Fjord. 
Parnell found it in the Firth of Forth. Since then it 
has been observed at several spots, though rarely, on 
the coast of Great Britain down to Cornwall. It seems 
to be commonest in Norway, where it has been met 
with in nearly all the fjords, in Christiania Fjord in 
particular. Here, according to Collett, it is taken on 
long-lines shot for Cod, and during the autumn months 
is almost daily brought to the fish-market of Christiania. 
On the coast of Boluislan it is comparatively rare, and 
occurs principally in spring. Winther considers the 
Four-Bearded Rockling to be the commonest Danish 
species of the genus, and gives two instances of its en- 
tering Liim Fjord from the North Sea. In the Sound 
it does not penetrate south of Saltholm, to the best of 
our knowledge; but its range extends through the Great 
Belt, where it is taken generally in spring, to the 
west of the Baltic, where it has been found now and 
then off Flensburg, Kiel, and Travemunde. These are 
the only localities in the Baltic where the species is 
known, with the exception of Gothland, where, accord- 
ing to Lindstrom, it lives at a depth of 50 — 70 fathoms, 
and is occasionally caught in winter. Here it attains 
a size of at least 35 cm. In the west of the Atlantic 
the Four-Bearded Rockling was discovered in 1848 in 
Massachusetts Bay by Storer, and again met with by 
Kroyer had met with examples of this species with much smaller air-bladder. 
