COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SCOMBROID FISHES. 
417 
long. Minute scales are found all over the body. Lateral line undulating, 
making a marked curve behind the second dorsal. Scales on the lateral line 
are about 230 in number. Teeth in jaws short, triangular, nearly straight, 
much compressed, and very minutely serrated as in Acanthocybium. There are 
about 30 in the upper and 20 in the lower jaw. Teeth on the vomer and 
palatines are very minute, granular and indistinct, as IvLUNZiNGEE rightly 
remarked “ viele rauhe Plättchen.” The intestine is very long, and bent four 
times. Air-bladder present. Lateral keel of the caudal peduncle rather low. 
Back greyish blue, and the loelly silvery. On side of the body about fifty 
transverse bands which fade gradually towards the ventral median line. In 
young specimens these bands are represented as elongated dots on the sides 
and very few in number. With the growth of the fish, these markings elongate 
and increase in number. Mouth cavity nearly colourless. 
The flesh is said to be fatty but firm, and is superior in taste to that of 
our common seerfish, Gybium niphonium. Spawning season seems to be in 
spring, when they visit the coast of Taiwan in schools. In July immature 
fishes of about ten cm. are found in Taiwan, and immature fishes of about 
twenty cm. in the markets of south China in autumn. 
The first specimen caught in Japan proper and identified as belonging to 
this species was found by Mr. Yozo Nakajima, at the northern coast of 
Yamaguchi-ken, and was sent to me for identification, in Dec. 1914. The 
fish measured 126 cm in the total length, and 20 kg in weight. According 
to Mr. Nakajima this species is caught on the Japan Sea coast of Yamaguchi- 
ken from October to January, in fixed seines or gill-nets for Seriola guinque- 
radicta. Only two or three are caught in a haul. Here they seem never 
to come to a ground shallower than 30 metres. 
This species is abundant on the west coast of Taiwan in winter and 
spring. It is very widely distributed in the Indo-Pacific region, being known 
in New Guinea, East India, India, Red Sea, Cape of Good Hope, Samoa, and 
Australia. Mr. I \. Miyagami collected many immature specimens in autumn 
in southern China, and a few stragglers are caught on both sides of the Strait 
of Chosen in autumn and winter. This species is remarkable for migrating to 
the north in cold months and to the south in warm montlis. Large schools 
are hauled in Taiwan in a seine or caught with troll-lines, set nets, or drift 
