JCBTHYOLOGICAL NOTES (No. 3).—0GILBY. 181 ICHTHYOLOGICAL NOTES (No. 3). By J. Douglas Ogilby, SELACHII. ORECTOLOBID^E. ORECTOLOBUS DEVISI nom. no v. So long ago as 1883 the late Mr. Charles W. cle Vis described an Orcctolobus from Moreton Bay under the name Crossorhhius otntatns. This name was at first considered to be a synonym of 0. maculatus {^^harhatus) by myself and others. Subsequentl,y, however, its validity was recognized by ]\Iessrs. Tate Regan, ]\IcCulloch, and the writer, the species dnly appearing in our respective reviews of the Orectolohidw as 0. oniatus.^ I now find that Bonaparte, under his genus Orcctolobus, 1834, listed Gray's ScijlUiim oruafum {-=Cliiloscijlliuni plagiosum Bennett) as Orcciolobns ornatns, thus invalidating de Vis' choice. I take, there-fore, a melancholy pleasure in renaming the species after my old friend. HYPOSTOMIDES. PEGASIDyE. PEGASUS VOLITANS Linnjeus.^ The Queensland Museum has received, during the past year, a specimen of tliis sea-dragon tlu'ough the kindness of Mrs. Tarnaros, whose husband brought it home from the Solomon Islands. This is the most easterly locality from which the species has as yet been recorded, but it had been obtained by Peters from New Britain as long ago as 1876.^ As regards Zalises umitcngu Jordan & Snyder,* founded on a single " dried specimen 75 millimeters long," I hardly think the characters given will bear scrutiny. The authors rely principally on " the longer and narrower snout and rather longer tail." A comparison between their description of these characters and the six examples now before me (Coast of Oueensland five, Solomons one) is instructive. In the type of Z. umitengu, in which it is claimed that the snout is " longer than in any other species," the pro]iortional measurement of the snout to the body-length is stated to be as 1 to 5 ; in my Queensland specimens this measurement varies from 1 to 4 to 1 to 4-75, in the Solomons specimen as 1 to 4-6 ; in all these examples, therefore, the snout is longer, and in some much longer, than in the Japanese fish."' The width of the snout to its length in front of the mouth is similarly varial)le. The length of the tail as compared with the head and trunk is not reliable. Giinther'' computes it as lieing equal to the distance between the posterior margin of the eye and the vent, 1 Regan, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1908, i, p. 347. Ogilby & McCuUoch, Proc. Roy. Soc. N. S. Wales, xlii, 1908, p. 264. -Syst. Nat., ed. 10, i, p. 338. 3 Mon. Akad. Berlin, 1876, p. 843. ' * Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., xxiv, p. 2. * The exact proportions for the Queensland specimens are as 1 to 4, 4-15, 4-2, 4-0, 4-75. « Brit. Mils. Catal. Fish., viii, p. 147.
BioStor
