Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1.: With an Account of the Coasts and Rivers Explored and Surveyed During; The Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in the Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43.; By Command of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. Also a Narrative; Of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits to the Islands in the Arafura Sea.Stokes, John Lort
History
Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1.: With an Account of the Coasts and Rivers Explored and Surveyed During; The Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in the Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43.; By Command of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. Also a Narrative; Of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits to the Islands in the Arafura Sea.
Stokes, John Lort
Australia -- Description and travel; Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Natural history -- Australia
The roughness runs forward on the chine
or ventral line, until it passes gradually into the ordinary scales of
the head. The dewlap is very slightly extensible, and but little
developed. It is supported by six thread-like rays, which are all divided
to the base.
A black band crosses the forehead from eye to eye. The upper half of the
eye is bordered with black. The first dorsal exclusive of its last ray is
of the same hue; a black band descends from it, and two from the second
dorsal, which meet in a stripe that extends from the eye to the tail, the
whole bearing some resemblance to the traces of a coach-horse. There is
also a black mark on the upper surface of the tail, and a minute brownish
speck on each scale, which specks form very faint rows on the cheeks and
belly. The ground tint is pale or whitish, with some duskiness on the
face, as if it had been coloured when recent. Length, 2 1/4 inches.
Height of body, 1 1/8 inch.
HABITAT. The western coasts of Australia.
...
Cristiceps axillaris. RICHARDSON.
CH. SPEC. C. pinnis intaminatis; macula argentata post os maxillare,
altera in summa gena pone oculum et tertia majori in axilla pectorali;
linea laterali argenteo-punctata.
RADII. B.6; D. 3 : --28 : 7; A. 2 : 25; C. 11; P. 11; V.1 : 2.
FISHES. PLATE 1. Figures 1, 2, 3.
This singularly delicate and clear-looking fish has, after long immersion
in spirits, a pale flesh colour, with transparent and spotless fins. A
bright silvery streak descends from the angle of the preorbitar to the
corner of the mouth, where it dilates a little. A speck of the same
colour exists within the upper limb of the preoperculum, and immediately
behind the pectoral fin there is a large oblong one. The little tubes
forming the lateral line are also silvery. It is with much doubt that I
name this species as distinct from the C. australis of the Histoire des
Poissons, but there some points in M. Valenciennes' description of that
fish which I cannot reconcile with the specimen now under consideration.
And first, with respect to scales, M. Valenciennes states that he could
detect none in australis, but in axillaris there are minute round scales,
lying rather wide of each other, each having central umbo and lines
radiating from it to the circumference. These scales are not easily seen
while the skin continues moist, but become apparent as it dries, and are
most numerous towards the tail. The head of axillaris is scaleless, and a
row of pores runs along the lower jaw, up the preoperculum, and along the
temporal groove. The eye is also encircled by similar pores. The muscular
fibres shine through the delicate skin as in australis, and the teeth on
the jaws and vomer appear to be similar. On comparing the specimen of
axillaris with the figure of australis in the Histoire des Poissons, the
second dorsal does not appear undulated as in the latter, but the spinous
rays increase gradually in height from the first, and the anterior dorsal
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