ihat connect the Orders and Families of Birds. 453 
Ramphastide. 
Psittacide, Leach. 
Picide, Leach. 
Certhiade. 
Cuculide, Leach. 
Commencing our examination of the present tribe with the 
family of Ramphastide, we may observe that it is composed of 
the genera Ramphastos, Linn., and Pteroglossus, Ill., which fill 
up the same station in the New World that Buceros, the group 
which we have just quitted, maintains in the Old. To these ge- 
nera we have already seen that Scythrops may be added, which 
appears equally assimilated to both groups, and thus to supply 
their place in that new division of the globe, the continent of 
Australasia. This genus, it may be observed, unites the present 
family with the larger and more prominent billed Cuculide, 
which meet it at the other extremity of the tribe: and here in 
this direction, the succession of affinities appears established. 
.'The immediate connexion, however, of Ramphastos with the 
succeeding group of Psittacide is not so evident. These fami- 
lies are placed next to each other by all systematic writers ; and 
I decidedly concur in the general views which bring them into 
neighbouring groups. But at present I am acquainted with no 
forms which intimately connect them, and soften down the im- 
portant difference observable in the bills and tongues of these 
birds. ‘This is one of the greatest chasms which interfere with 
the continuity of our chain of affinities. I might indeed hazard 
some suggestions* as to the mode in which this difficulty may 
..'* [ might particularly mention the Trogon, Linn., asa bird, whose bill, serrated, but 
at the same time short and hooked, seems to giveit a similitude to each of these groups. 
We know but little of this genus, although it abounds both in the Old and New World, 
and that little is altogether insufficient to afford us any information as to its actual 
affinities. 
aN? be 
