A review of the trachinoid fishes and their supposed allies found in the waters of Japan

In the present paper is given an account of tlie fishes of Japan belonging to families which have been regarded hitherto as allied to the Traehinida?, The material examined was for the most part collected by the writers during the summer of 1900, under the auspices of the Hopkins Seaside Laboratory of Stanford University, although several specimens were obtained by the U. S. Fish Commission steamer AJhatro-ss. Series of types are in the museum of Stanford University and in the United States National Museum. The illustrative drawings are the work of Mr. A. H. Baldwin and Chloe Lesley Starks. The group Trachinoidea comprises a series of transitional forms, showing affinities with the Percoidea on the one hand and with the Batrachoidida3 and Blennoidea on the other. In general, the spinous dorsal is short or weak, the soft dorsal long and similar to the anal, the ventral jugular and the squamation is less complete and less ctenoid than in the Percoidea. The skull is, in general, depressed, with the supraocular crest low, and the suborbital stay is wanting, although in some genera the suborbital bones are enlarged. The bones of the skull are not strongly armed, and the ventral fins always inserted well forward, and they are sometimes reduced in size. According to recent studies of Dr. Boulenger,^ the Traehinida proper have the hypercoracoid imperforate, as in the Gadidie. Their general relationship with the cod-fishes and blennies is such that Boulenger proposes to revive the suborder Jugulares to include not only the Gadoid fishes, but the Ophidioid, Blennioid, and Trachinoid forms also, in fact, all fishes having truly jugular ventrals. Several families hitherto called Trachinoid, but which possess thoracic ventrals. should be wideh' dissociated. In most cases their real place is not far from the Percoid forms. In the present paper these families are considered as well as the genuine Trachinoids.