The following are descriptions of the markings of four small barra cudas taken at Tortugas in the season of 1917, which were kindly sent to me by Dr. A. G. Mayer. In transit the bottle containing them was broken and they reached me in a dried condition, but with their color markings quite clear and well defined. No. 1, measuring 2.6 inches from tip of snout to base of caudal, has, between that point and the hinder edge of the opercle, about 9 dark blotches which extend across the dorsum and down to the belly on each side. Another fish of the same length, but hardly so bulky, has about 7 of these saddle-shaped bands. A third, 2.35 inches to the base of the caudal, has about 6. The last and smallest (2.25 inches) has 7 bands, possibly the most definitely marked off of all. In addition to these bands noted, there is another, not quite so clear, extending from the fore part of one opercle across the back to the other gill-cover. Again, on the dorsum, across the base of the skull, all four specimens show a dark blotch.
These bands are especially large and are somewhat irregular in shape in the region of the lateral line on each side. On the median line of the dorsum, especially in the region of the second dorsal fin, these bands run together, giving these parts a very dark, even black appear ance. There can be no doubt that, as the fish grows older, the dorsal connection disappears and the lateral parts of the bands are left as the dark bars or splotches described above and shown in figure 1, plate r.
These colors referred to above were noted on my fish after death. In life the color of the fish readily accommodates itself to its surround ings. A large barracuda basking near the surface of the water in the neighborhood of a coral head, a buoy or a channel stake, appears much as a ghost fish, a shadowy wraith. Another lying near the bot tom over coral sand will so accommodate itself to its environment as to be almost unnoticeable so long as it remains quiet. Wood Jones (1912) says that it is the hardest of all sea fish to see.