SHOE-BILL. 



171 



all exhibiting the same form and structure, and some of them containing at least a large 

 cartload of sticks. The latter author also informs us that the nests are so solid that 

 they will bear the weight of a large, heavy man on the domed roof without collapsing. 

 Such an enormous structure is built by a single pair, and the bird itself is not larger 

 than our night-herons. 



Remarks similar to those which preceded the foregoing family might equally well 

 apply to the present one, the BAL^NICIPITIDJE. This too is African, and comprises a 

 single species, which in a somewhat similar way is intermediate between storks and 





-- V .^, .- 



-^ ' $ 



~~ - J ' 



"^V( 



FIG. 84. Scopus umbrctta, umbrette. 



herons. Considerable diversity of opinion exists as to its real affinities. Some authors 

 make it unconditionally a heron ; others regard it as separate ; others again unite it 

 with the umbrette. The anatomy of its soft parts are as yet unknown, so our con- 

 clusions have to be based upon the skeleton and the external characters. It 

 appears to us that the shoe-bill (JBaloBniceps) is intermediate between storks and 

 herons, but as the umbrette inclines towards the storks, so does the shoe-bill to the 

 herons. The two birds themselves are also rather closely related, perhaps more so 

 inter se than with either storks or herons proper. There seems, however, to be 



