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Show 186 PISCES. well cleft; operculum and suboperculum spinous; six branchial rays; the ventrals narrow, inserted under the throat, and formed of but three rays, the first of which is elongated and widened; pectorals supported by a short arm, the result of the elongation of the carpal bones. The first dorsal is short, and supported by three spinous rays; the second is soft and long, as well as that of the anus which corresponds to it. The lips are frequently furnished with filaments. Those which have been dissected present a stomach resembling an oblong sac, and short intestines, but there is no crecum. The fore· part of the natatory bladder is deeply bifurcated. They keep them. selves hidden in the sand, to surprize their prey, like the Lophius &c.; the wounds inflicted by their spines are reputed dangerous: They are found in both oceans. Some of them have a smooth and fungous skin and a cutaneous appendage over the eye.(l) Others are covered with scales, and have no appendage over the eye.(2) We might distinguish those in which the scales and cirri are wanting, but which have lines of pores pierced in the skin,(3) and hooked teeth in the lower jaw. FAMILY XIV. LABROIDES. This family is easily recognized; the body is oblong and sca~y; .a single dorsal is supported in front by spines, each of wh1c~ IS generally furnished with a membranous appendage; the Jaws are covered with fleshy lips; there are three pha· ryngeals, two upper ones attached to the cranium, and a large lower one, all three armed with teeth, now en pave and then ( 1) Batr. tau, ( GaduB tau, L. ), or Lophius bufo, Mitch., or Batraclwide verneul, Lesueur, Mem. Mus., V, xvii;-the Batr. varie, Id. A c. Nat. Sc. Phil.;-Batr. grunni· ~ ( Cottus gru_nniena, L. ), Bl., 179, Seb. III, xxiii, 4;-Batr. gangene, Duch., XIV, ;-Battr. dulnus, Cuv., or L. dubius, J, White 265 Nieuhof Ap Will Ap. IV 1·-Batr 4 · · ' ' ' ., ., ' ' · :·~tnts, Cuv., or Batr. diemensis, Lesueur, Ac. Nat. Sc. Philad. B (2co) nsB a•t r.. surtnamenais' Bl ., Sell n., P1 · v.u. , g.w en as the Tau, Lacep., II, xu.. , 1;- . punllum, ?u.v., or the pretended Batr. tau, Bl., pl. lxvii, f. 2 and 3. (3) Bat. porostss-tmus Cuv Ni' · M . . · 2 9S N ' ., zquz, arcgr., 178, or the second Nzqm ofP1son, · .B. The first Niqu' f p· 2 4 · 1 1 f t 0 tson, 9 , 1s a badly copied figure from the co· ec ton called Mentzel's, to which the engraver has added scales. ACANTHOPTERYGII. 187 pointed or laminiform, but generally stronger than usual; an intestinal canal either without creca, or with two very small ones, and a strong nata tory bladder. LABRus, Lin. A very numerous genus of fishes which strongly resemble each other in their oblong form; their double fleshy lips, from which they derive their name, one adhering immediately to the jaws and the other to the suborbitals; their crowded branchire with five rays; their conical maxillary teeth, the middle and anterior of which are the longest, and their cylindrical and blunt pharyngeal teeth arranged en pave, the upper ones on two large plates, the lower on a single one which corresponds to the two others. Their stomach does not form a cul-de-sac, but is continuous with an intestine without creca, which after two inflexions, terminates in a large rectum. They have a single and strong natatory bladder. LABRus, properly so called. The opercula and preopercula without spines or dentations; the cheek and operculum covered with scales; the lateral line straight, or nearly so. The seas of Europe produce several species the variation of whose colours rarely allows them to be clearly distinguished. ( 1) L. maculatus; Duham. Sect. IV, pl. ii, f. 1; Lab. maculatua, Bl. 284?; Lab. bergilta, Ascan. Ic. I. From a foot to eighteen inches in length; twenty or twenty-one dorsal spines; blue or greenish above, white beneath; every where chequered with fawn colour, which sometimes becomes general.(2) L. variegatus, Gm.; L. lineatua, Penn. XLV, cop. Encycl. 402. One or more clouded, irregular dark bands along the flank, on a ground more or less reddish; sixteen or seventeen spines in the dorsal, which is marked with a dark spot in front.(3) (1) With respect to these fishes we can neither trust to the figures of Bloch nor to the descriptions of Gmelin. (2) The JTielle tachetee was indicated by Lacep., under the name of Labreneus· trien. It is possible that the Labrus maculatus, ni., 294, was a bad figure of it, taken from a dried specimen whose colours had been entirely changed; the La· bruatinca, Shaw, Nat. Misc., 426, and Gen. Zool., IV, pl. ii, p. 499, is a beautiful variety, red spotted with white, but is not the tinea of Lin.; the LalJ. ballan, Penn., 44, cop. Encycl., 400, is the fawn coloured variety; the L. comber, Penn., XLU, cop. Encycl., 405, is a red variety, with a suite of white spots along the flank. (3) The only good drawing of this fish is that of Pennant; I suspect the Labr. \ |
