112 



MYIOTHERINyE. 



FLYCHASER8, AND ALLIED GENERA. 



The extensive family of the Myiotherinpe, of which species 

 are found in all the warm and temperate parts of the globe, 

 has in Britain only two representatives, the Grey and the Pied 

 Flycatchers, which in form are so closely allied to many species 

 of the Sylvianse, that a person unacquainted with the more re- 

 markable exotic genera might naturally conceive it to be quite 

 unwarrantable to refer them to a family distinct from the War- 

 blers. If we compare Muscicapa grisola with Sylvia atrica- 

 pilla, these birds being nearly of the same size, we find that 

 the differences presented by their bills are extremely slight, 

 the one having that organ merely a little broader at the base and 

 less compressed at the end than the other, that their plumage 

 is precisely similar in texture, their wings and tail scarcely dif- 

 ferent in any appreciable degree, and their feet of the same 

 form, although those of the Flycatcher are very much smaller, 

 and in fact so singularly diminutive as to remind us of those 

 of the Swallows. But if we bring together specimens of va- 

 rious species of this group, we find that considered collectively 

 they may with propriety be viewed as constituting a family, 

 possessing decided characters, of which it will suffice here to 

 indicate the more prominent. 



The family of Myiotherinse then is composed of birds general- 

 ly of small size, none of them being so large as a Jackdaw, while 

 some are extremely diminutive. Their bill, Fig. 254, is straight, 

 of a tapering form, but depressed or flattened, it being much 

 broader than high at the base, and generally compressed only 

 just at the tip. The upper mandible has its dorsal outline de- 

 clinato -convex, the ridge narrow and distinct, the sides slop- 

 ing and becoming more convex toward the end, the edges sharp 



