120 
ICHTHYOLOGY 
The largest of my specimens is over twenty-four inches in 
length. 
Noumea, New Caledonia. 
HEMIRHxVMPHUS COMMERSONII. 
Hemirhamphus Commersonii, Guv. and Vat., vol. xix., 
p. 28. 
The specimen is seventeen inches long. This sort has been 
found in the Red Sea, all along the east coast of Africa, and 
in the Indian Archipelago. 
GASTEROTOKEUS BIACULEATUS. 
Syngnathus Biaculeatus, Block., pi. 121, fig. 1. 
. Bl. Schn., pi. 107. 
The absence of a caudal fin, the depressed body, the 
well developed pectorals and the long dorsal, places this 
genus very near Stigmatophora ; its caudal slightly prehensible 
has caused it to be included in the group of Hippocampina, 
but it is much nearer allied to the fiyngnathidce. 
The spine of the superciliary margin being bifide, I am not 
certain that the specimen belongs to the sort figured by 
Bloch. 
The height of the body is contained nearly twice in its 
breadth ; the snout, up to the nostrils, is only a little longer 
than the remaining portion of the head ; it is compressed and 
has a longitudinal sulcate, which runs rather obliquely from 
its extremity to the centre of the anterior edge of the orbit ; 
there is a short bifide spine over the orbit directed backwards, 
and a small bunch of three or four spines arms the posterior 
edge of the head, which is strongly granulated ; the operculuni 
has two longitudinal ridges, which unite in front, the space 
between them is longitudinally sulcated, but below them the 
sulcates are radiated. The suborbitor presents several blunt 
spines ; the body becomes gradually very broad towards its 
centre ; its section presents an irregular quadrilator, narrow 
on the back and very broad on the sides ; the two upper 
ridges do not extend further than the dorsal, but the lower 
ones follow on the tail. There are eighteen body rings and 
