The _Evermannellidæ_ is a small family of small deep-sea fishes with large teeth, distensible muscles, and an extraordinary power of swallowing other fishes, scarcely surpassed by _Chiasmodon_ or _Saccopharynx_. _Evermannella_ (_Odontostomus_, the latter name preoccupied) and _Omosudis_ are the principal genera.
The _Paralepidæ_ are reduced allies of _Plagyodus_, slender, silvery, with small fins and fang-like jaws. As in _Plagyodus_, the adipose fin is developed and there are small luminous dots. The species are few and mostly northern; one of them, _Sudis ringens_, is known only from a single specimen taken by the present writer from the stomach of a hake (_Merluccius productus_), the hake in turn swallowed whole by an albacore in the Santa Barbara Channel. The _Sudis_ had been devoured by the hake, the hake by the albacore, and the albacore taken on the hook before the feeble _Sudis_ had been digested.
FIG. 97.—_Eurypholis sulcidens_ Pictet, restored. Family _Enchodontidæ_. Upper Cretaceous of Mt. Lebanon. (After Woodward, as _E. boissieri_.) ]
Perhaps allied to the _Plagyodontidæ_ is also the large family of _Enchodontidæ_, widely represented in the Cretaceous rocks of Syria, Europe, and Kansas. The body in this group is elongate, the teeth very strong, and the dorsal fin short. _Enchodus lewesiensis_ is found in Mount Lebanon, _Halec sternbergi_ in the German Cretaceous, and many species of _Enchodus_ in Kansas; _Cimolichthys dirus_ in North Dakota.
Remotely allied to these groups is the extinct family of _Dercetidæ_ from the Cretaceous of Germany and Syria. These are elongate fishes, the scales small or wanting, but with two or more series of bony scutes along the flanks. In _Dercetis scutatus_ the scutes are large and the dorsal fin is very long. Other genera are _Leptotrachelus_ and _Pelargorhynchus_. Dr. Boulenger places the _Dercetidæ_ in the order _Heteromi_. This is an expression of the fact that their relations are still unknown. Probably related to the _Dercetidæ_ is the American family of _Stratodontidæ_ with its two genera, _Stradodus_ and _Empo_ from the Cretaceous (Niobrara) deposits of Kansas. _Empo nepaholica_ is one of the best-known species.
FIG. 98.—_Eurypholis freyeri_ Heckel. Family _Enchodontidæ_. Cretaceous. (After Heckel; the restoration of the jaws incorrect.) ]