450 PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



views, I cannot pass it by in silence, inasniucb as Mic present study may 

 be regarded as a reaction, provoked by the arrangement proposed in 

 the above mentioned work. 



It may then be proper to state first, that the definition of the group 

 Turdidcv (=Seebohm's Turdincc), given by Mr. Seebohm, seems to be a 

 very proper one, and I think he has therein exi)ressed the only chief 

 character which really indicates the relationship of the birds to be in- 

 cluded in this family. The peculiar spotted first plumage of the Tur- 

 (lid(e is a very striking feature, and its coincidence with booted tarsi very 

 remarkable. A careful comparison with forms, which, without showing 

 those characters, have at different times been referred to the Turdida', 

 will convince us that the limits traced by Mr. Seebohm are the only re- 

 hable ones, and that the family thus defined is a very natural group,^ 

 and, indeed, one of the best among the Fasserca. It is only to be re- 

 gretted that Mr. Seebohm did not include a few other forms which have 

 the same peculiarities. I may especially allude to the 31yadestincc, the- 

 position of whicsh will be discussed in lull below\ His concluding re- 

 marks on page 2 seem, however, to indicate that he himself has been 

 aware of this fault. 



It is not difficult to foresee that his definition of the family will be 

 heartily accepted by ornithologists, but it is, on the other hand, prob- 

 able that his peculiar generic arrangement will meet common opposi- 

 tion. 



Mr. Seebohm states {p. viii) that he has "been obliged to fiill back 

 upon color or pattern of color as the only character which indicates 

 near relationship." 



To see how he has carried this out, let us first take his genus Geo- 

 cichla^ of which he says (p. 148), that it "on the whole must be consid- 

 ered one of the best defined of the family Turdida'.^^ One needs only to 

 compare his plates X and XI in order to be convinced that he does not 

 mean the general coloration of the bird, as the two plates represent birds, 

 the general coloration of which is, at least, as different as that of a Itobiu 

 and a Rock-Thrush, which he refers to different genera. The diagnosis 

 of the genus shows, also, that special imiiortance is attached only to the 

 pattern of the under surface of the wing, these birds "having the outside 

 web of all the secondaries and of many of the primaries white, occasion- 

 ally tinted with bufi', but abruptly defined from the brown ot the rest of 

 the quills," and the "axillaries parti-colored, the basal half being white 

 and the terniinal half black, slate gray, or brown. Most of the wing- 

 coverts are similarly parti-colored, but the relative iiosition of the colors 

 is reversed, the white i)ortion being on the terminal half." But these 

 characters do not hold good in all species, as Mr. Seebohm himself in- 

 dicates. There are several excejitions, or, as he calls them, "aberrant 

 species," which have the "axillaries and under wing-coverts uniform in 

 color," and there are several species which he refers to other genera, 



