Species of the Family Pteroptochidse. 191 



" Pteroptochinse " and " Menurinse/' the latter designed for 

 the peculiar Australian type Menura. But looking to the 

 very singular osteological characters which Prof. Huxley has 

 pointed out in Menura*, and to the fact that instead of pos- 

 sessing the peculiar laryngeal conformation of the Tracheo- 

 phonaef it is provided with five pair of singing-muscles, 

 there seems to be no doubt the Menura represents a distinct 

 family, " Menuridie/' quite different from all other Passeres, 

 and to be referred to the division Oscines. The Pteroptochidse 

 must remain, therefore, as an independent family of them- 

 selves, to be placed, according to my views, at the end of the 

 Tracheophonine section of the Passeres, and at once distin- 

 guishable from all other Passeres by the posterior margin of 

 the sternum being doubly emarginated, as in the Pici and 

 many Coccyges J. 



Of the Pteroptochidse, as thus limited, I distinguish eight 

 generic forms, which may be shortly diagnosed as follows, it 

 being understood that nearly every one of them possesses other 

 well-marked characters besides, the chief of which are com- 

 mented upon under the separate generic heads, 



a, mesorhinio compresso, rotundato, lineariformi. 

 a', rostro tenui, subulato. 



a". Cauda brevi : lororum plumis brevibus . . 1. Scytalopus. 

 b". Cauda longa : lororum plumis exstantibus 2. Merulaxis. 

 b'. rostro robusto. 



c". tarsorum scutis obsoletis : rostri culmine 



recto 3. Lioscehs. 



d". tarsorum scutis divisis : rostri culmiue 

 inciu'vo. 



* P. Z. S. 1867, p. 472. 



t See Eyton's account of the trachea of Menura, ^^n. N. H. vii. p. 49 

 (1841). 



X The only other known Passerine form in which two emarginations 

 are present on each side of the posterior margin of the sternum is the 

 Australian genus Atrichia. Whether this form certainly belongs to the 

 Pteroptochidse, cannot be positively ascertained until the structure of its 

 larynx is known ; but I have little doubt that such is the case. There is 

 a sternum of Atrichia rvfescens in the Cambridge Museum. 



p 2 



