1887.] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 385 



tion of tbeir entire structure, when possibly we may discover some re- 

 liable diiferences between them. 





3. Rifrht lateral view of the skull of Nycticorax nycticorax noevius. Life-size, adult -f ; drawn by the 

 author from a specimeu collected by Dr. Streets at San Diego, California, q, quadrate; I, lacrymal; 

 mxp, niaxillo-palatiue ; pi, palatine ; pt, pterygoid. 



The sl:ull, sternum, <ind shoulder girdle of Geococcyx calif ami anus. — I 

 have already published a detailed account of the skeleton t of this 

 exceedingly interesting- form, and have had the opportunity to examine 

 a number of their skeletons. My tyi)e skeleton I presented to the 

 museum of the University of Cambridge, where, through the kind- 

 ness of Prof. Alfred ISTcwton, it has been mounted for the collectiou. The 

 specimens before me, collected by Dr. Streets, do not differ in any of 

 their important details from the corresi)ondiug- parts of tlie skeletons 

 of the others that I have examined. I find, however, that the delicate 

 rowjer usually present in the skull of this Ground Cuckoo is missing 

 in the si)ecimen before me, and probably has been lost. Col. James 

 Stevenson, of the U. S. National Museum, who has recently been in 

 Southern California, tells me that he saw upon two occasions the ranch- 

 men of that part of the country /^hase one of these birds on horseback 

 for a distance of a mile or more at full speed, when the cuckoo, being in 

 the lead, would suddenly stop and fly up among the upper limbs of 

 some stunted tree or bush at the roadside, and the rider, who has kept 

 it in view all the time, dismounts and easily takes the exhausted bird 

 from its perch alive. A specimen I dissected about a year ago I am 

 told was captured in that way. 



The slaiUs* sterna,* and shoulder girdles* of Corvus corax sinuatus. — 

 For more than two years past 1 have collected specimens of Eavens 

 about Fort Wingate, X. Mex., here, and prepared skeletons of them; 

 I have also fully figured this part of their anatomy in all its details, 

 and had come to believe that thb skeletons of my specimens differed in 

 no way from those of other birds of this species from any other part of 

 the United States. But upon receiving Dr. Streets' collection I found 



tSliiifeldt, R. W. The Skeleton in Geococcyx: Jonr. of Auat. and Phys., London 

 and Edinburgh, Vol. XX, Pt. II, Jan., 1886, pp. 244-2b6, Plates VII, VIII, and IX. 



Proc. N. M. 87 25 



