Miscellaneous. 75 



have long been satisfied that the Flamingoes (Phoenicopterus) should 

 be ranged among the Lamellirostres or Anatidce, a position which has 

 also been assigned to them by Mr. Swainson : this latter author, in 

 common with most of the recent British writers on ornithology, has 

 referred the Pratincoles to the Charadriadte or Plover family, asso- 

 ciating them more immediately with Cursorius ; but Mr. Jenyns (in 

 his 'British Vertebrata'), really as if selecting the most ow^re posi- 

 tion he could find, has included this genus in his Rallidce* ! There, 

 too, Mr. Yarrell (in his ' British Birds ') has followed him in group- 

 ing it ; but this naturalist was so fortunate as to obtain an egg of 

 our present species, which he has figured, and remarks, that " the 

 Pratincole has been arranged by some authors with the Swallows, 

 by others near the Rails ; but I believe, with Mr. Selby, that it ought 

 to be included in the family of the Plovers ; and had I known its 

 plover-like habits and eggs sooner, I should have arranged it between 

 Cursorius and Charadrius." The figure of the egg which he has 

 given, however, appears to me to accord still better with my view of 

 the affinities of this genus. Several years ago, Mr. Gould called my 

 attention to the fact that the Collared Pratincole had a slightly-pec- 

 tinated middle claw, and suggested to me whether, after all, the 

 great Swedish naturalist was not right, at least in bringing this bird 

 among the Insessores Fissirostres of Vigors ; but at that time I in- 

 clined to hold a diflferent opinion, and so far as the structure in 

 question is concerned, that alone could scarcely influence the syste- 

 matic position of the genus, as it occurs in widely separated fami- 

 lies!; a-r^d as I have further always held the opinion that the Pressi- 

 rostres and Longirostres of Cuvier (corresponding to the Charadriadce 

 and ScolopaciddB of modern English systematists) composed but a 

 single great series, essentially distinct from the Cultrirostres, Cuv. 

 (vel Gruidce et Ardeadce) which the illustrious French zoologist in- 

 terposed between the former, an analogous conformation was not 

 wanting in that series, as instanced by the Black-tailed Godwit {Li- 

 mosa melanurd), while no trace of it occurs in the Bar-tailed Godwit 

 {L.fedoa). Examining, however, the entire foot of a recent Pratin- 

 cole, it will be seen that the resemblance it bears to that of Capri- 

 mulgus extends to the peculiar scutation, to the general form of the 

 toes, and especially to the circumstance of the back-toe being di- 

 rected inward ; and whoever has witnessed the creeping gait of a 

 British Moth-hunter (Caprimulgus) on the ground, will not fail to 

 recognise in that of the Pratincole an exact similarity ; moreover, 

 many species of Caprimulgus have the tarse as much elongated as in 

 Glareola, and I have been informed that certain of these assemble 

 numerously on the mud-flats near the shores of some of the West 

 India islands, where their habits would appear to resemble those 

 stated of the Pratincoles. The mode of flight, too, of the latter is 



* I need not ask what character it has in common with the Rails, but 

 rather what it has not in direct and obvious opposition to them ? 



f E.g., in many Caprimulgidie, Ardeadce, and Pelicanidce; its intent 

 being apparently to cleanse the rictus from such fish-scales, &c. as may ad- 

 here thereto, or, in the instance of the Caprimulgidce, to detach the legs of 

 beetles which may ditch, and thus impede the bird's swallowing them. 



