On a group of Psittacidce known to the Ancients, &l 



a tendency to a suctorial mode of feeding, I felt much anxiety 

 to ascertain this point ; but although the Blue Mountain Lory 

 has frequently been brought alive to this country, it has not been 

 until lately that I have been enabled io examine the structure 

 of the tongue. By the kindness of a gentleman,* whose ex- 

 tensive anatomical preparations of birds, executed with an 

 accuracy and elegance hitherto unparalleled, and whose acute 

 observations on the structure of their principal organs which 

 have come before him in the course of such interesting labours 

 promise the most beneficial results to science, I have at length 

 had an opportunity of seeing the tongue of a recent specimen. 

 I have thus ascertained that this member in the species in ques* 

 tion is totally different from the tongues of Parrots in general, 

 which it may be recollected bear a considerable resemblance io 

 that of man, — so much so as to have caused Aristotle to call these 

 birds indiscriminately -^^irrotKyi and av^^o/woyXoTTov, and to have oc- 

 casioned the epigrammatist in the foregoing quotation + from the 

 '' Anthologia" to invest the group with the epithet of ^^oroyvi^vs; 

 — the structure of it in fact is decidedly brushlike or tubular. 

 Besides Psit. hcematodus this genus contains two species hitherto 

 confourtded with that bird, and also Psit, concinnus, Shaw, and 

 pusillus, Lath. J This group however belongs to the Ornithology of 

 New Holland ; and as Dr. Horsfield and myself are engaged in in- 

 vestigating that subject with a reference to the extensive Australa* 



* I am indebted to Mr. Yarrell of St. James's for the opportunity of ex* 

 amining the tongue of this bird, and of exhibiting it at a Meeting of the Zoor 

 logical Club of the Liimean Society [April 12th, 1824] ; as well as for much 

 valuable information respecting the internal anatomy of birds, which has 

 thrown considerable light upon my researches into their affinities. A vast 

 fund of truly scientifick information may be deduced from the researches which 

 that gentleman has pursued with much assiduity and success. 

 . + See p. 42. 



^ I am informed by Mr. Caley, the founder of the valuable Australasian 

 collection belonging to the Linnean Society, that the above little species PsiL 

 pusillus feeds occasionally by suction. He has himself supplied that bird with 

 honey, and moistened sugar, which it imbibed with ease and seeming delight; 

 The brushlike structure of the tongue in this specie j is mentioned also I fin^ 

 by Dr. Shaw [Gen. Zool. Vol. VilL p. 471.] and Dr. Latham [Syn. Vol. II. 

 p. 194. Ed. 2'^M 



