1 1'» 



' ' • lilltl) CALI.Kln. 



base. Tliey iiiiiabit the dense forests or thick undergrowth of Central 

 .and South America, and resemble Tits in their habits ; but their food 

 consists of fruits, berries, and seeds rather than iusects, and their 

 shallow nests are suspended from tlie Ijrauclies of low slirubs. Two 

 subfamilies are recognised — the P/priiue, including the smaller species 

 in which the sexes are usually dissimilar, the males being brilliantly 

 coloured and the females dull, and the FtUoc/ilor/rue, birds of large size, 

 mostly with dull plumage. Among the Pipriine we may call attention 

 to C7i/orojjijjo jiavicdpillii (1693), with its elongate wings and tail, to 

 Cirrhopipru fiVimiida (1698), witli the shafts of the tail-feathers ending 

 in long stiff filaments, to the members of the genera Metopia (1695) 

 and Mitshia (1696-7), with their erect frontal plumes, and to the 

 numerous species of brilliantly coloured Pipra (1700-5). Macharo- 

 pteriis deUciuslis (1707) is remarkable for the extraoi-dinary structure of 

 the secondary Hight-feathcrs in the male, and Chiroxiphia linearis ( 1 707 a) 

 for the thickened shafts of the primary quills and the greatly length- 

 ened middle tail-feathers. The allied C. caudata (1708) is known in 

 Brazil as the "Dansador" or "Fandango-bird," on account of its 

 peculiar habit of dancing. When several individuals are assembled 

 together, one often sits and pipes, while the remainder dance up and 

 down to the music. When the musician becomes exhausted, he joins 

 the dancers, and another takes his place. Of the PtilochloriiKe examples 

 will be found in Ptilochluris squamatus (1716) and the sombre-coloured 

 Heteropeliiia InrdinviK (1714). 



Family III. Oxviuiampuidi:. Shakp-hills. 



[CnscTO.] The three representatives of this family belong to the genus O.vy- 

 rhamphus (1719), fouud in Central and South America. They are 

 easily distinguished from the Tyrannnhe by the straight sharp-pointed 

 bill and by the strongly serrated outer w eb of the first primary quill in 

 the male. 



Family IV. T\ hanxiu.e. Tyrant-birds. 

 [CiiH'To. ; q'ljis large and much varied group, numbering over 400 species, is 

 entirely restricted to the New World, and is distributed over every part, 

 except the extreme uorth, in greater or less abundance. Some of the 

 species are migratory, breeding in North America and wandering south 

 in winter to Central and South America. They appear to take the 

 place of the Flycatchers (Muscicapidce) of the Old World, and, as in 

 these birds, the majority have the bill greatly flattened aiul beset with 

 bristles. From the other Oligomyodian families of the Mesomyodian 

 Passeres they are distinguished by the scaling of the tarsi and by having 

 the toes nearly free, as in the typical Passerine groups. 



