Art. XXII.—On a New Species of Fish, Coryphænoides Novæ Zelandiæ; Native name, Okarari.

By James Hector, M.D., F.R.S.

(Plate XVIII., fig. 1.)

[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, October 22, 1870.]

In August last, the fish which forms the subject of this notice was brought to me as a Frost-fish, to which rare fish, from its narrow body and silvery colour, it bears a general resemblance. It however belongs to a group more allied to that which includes the cod, and, from its having no caudal fins, to the family Macruridœ, and, from the absence of ridges on the skull, to the genus Coryphœnoides. At the same time, it is distinct from any species described by Dr. Günther (Fishes of Brit. Mus., Vol. iv., p. 395), by the position of the vent, which is set much further back than the commencement of the second dorsal fin.

The colour of the fish, when fresh, was silver grey, a little darker above than beneath, with a pale brown patch extending on each side from above the eye to the pectoral fin. The fins were all darker in colour than the body.

The eye is remarkably large in proportion to the size of the head. The iris of a pale bluish brown.

From under the jaw there is a long bifid barbel, as in the cod.

The teeth are in two series, the outer row set fine, and the inner long and recurved.

P. 12. V. 8. 1st D. 12. 2nd 102. A. 92.

Only one mutilated specimen, now in the British Museum, appears to have been obtained in the Australian seas of any of the species of this genus, and as the specimen above described differs in a very marked manner from the figure and description of that fish given in Richardson's work, I think it must be undescribed, and therefore propose to call it Coryphœnoides Novœ Zelandiœ.

Its length is 21 inches; height 2 ½ inches; thickness about ¾ inch.

The diameter of the orbit is nearly 1 ¼ inch; and the gape 1 ¾ inch long.

The only specimen yet obtained was caught off Ward Island, in Port Nicholson.