i6 
Memoirs of the Indian Museum. 
[VOL. II, 
strongly dilated on the margin of the nostril. Anterior dorsal fin slightly behind 
the pelvic fins, the claspers reaching as far as its anterior margin in the male ; 
both dorsal fins short and high, snbequal, separated by several times the length 
of the anterior fin. Denticles minutely granular all over the dorsal surface, barely 
enlarged on the mid-dorsal line. 
Colour of the dorsal surface uniform brownish grey or olive-green in the adult ; sides 
of the snout pale in young specimens ; numerous faint white spots all over the 
dorsal surface of the body in the unborn young. 
Jaws nearly straight. Teeth small, with the transverse ridge so strongly convex that 
when viewed in profile they appear to be almost conical with a flattened base. 
Several adult specimens of this species were obtained by the “ Golden Crown” 
off the entrance to the Eastern Channel of the river Hughli in a depth of about 30 
fathoms in February, 1909, and a small male, which was presented by Mr. J. H. 
Row and identified b}’" Col. Alcock, has been in the Museum for some years. It was 
taken in the Mutlah river, which connects the Salt Lakes near Calcutta with the sea. 
Günther mentions an adult female of 700 mm. and an adult male of 750 mm. from 
Japan. A female from the Eastern Channel with five young in its oviduct measured 
500 mm., while an apparently adult male measured 336 mm. The transverse 
diameter across the pectoral fins was in the former case i87'5 mm. The young from 
the oviduct of this specimen measured 120 mm. in length and 44 mm. across the disk. 
Their snouts, although produced, terminated much more abruptly than was the case 
in the adult, the two sides being nearly?- parallel. In the mother the length of the 
snout (measured from the e}^es) was contained 5-62 times in the total length, while in 
the young it was contained 6 -66 times. 
R. schlegelii has been recorded from the east coast of Africa as well as from Chinese 
and Japanese seas. 
Family RAJIDÆ (Skates). 
Head and body forming a rhombic disk, much flattened ; the pectoral fins extending 
to the snout ; tail quite distinct. vSkin usually bearing spines and large denticles. 
Tail with a longitudinal fold on each side and a caudal fin, which is degenerate in 
some genera ; dorsal fins present. No electric organ. No serrated caudal spine. 
In Day’s works on Indian ichthyology only one member of this family is recorded 
as occurring in Indian seas, viz., Platyrhina schonleinii. In recent years, however, 
six species of Raja{oi which four are markedly distinct from one another, although each 
species is founded on a single specimen) have been described by Alcock or Lloyd. A 
specimen which I take to belong to Alcock’ s Ra]a powellii was recently taken in shal- 
low water off Trivandrum on the west coast of India and has been presented to the 
Indian by the Trivandrum Museum ; but the members of the family belong essentially, 
so far as Indian seas are concerned, to the deep-sea fauna. Captain R. E. Lloyd has 
therefore dealt with them in a paper (to be issued in the Memoirs of the Indian Museum 
almost simultaneously with this one) on the deep-sea fishes taken by the ‘ ‘ Investiga- 
tor ” since the publication of Col. Alcock’s monograph. No Rajidæ have been taken 
by the “ Golden Crown.” 
