402 Dr. J. Murie on the Motmots and their Affinities. 



Jardine^ (through Mr. Kh-k, a friend of his) for some inter- 

 esting information on moot points. Other descriptions of a mis- 

 cellaneous kind are tobe found scattered through various volumes. 



The birds are solitary, or live in pairs, preferring the shady 

 recesses of the forest. They sit motionless on a low branch, 

 often in nooks near rivulets, wherefrom they dart on their prey. 

 Swainson says they catch their prey on the wing (Fissirostres) ; 

 but Kirk avers that they alight to seize it. Ordinarily their food is 

 insects, reptiles, and fruits. In captivity a bold mistrusting bird, 

 the Motmot will then eat bread, raw meat, oranges, water-melons, 

 small birds, mice, lizards, snakes, cockroaches, &c. On pouncing 

 on these latter, they afterwards strike them violently against the 

 ground or perch. Songless, their only cry is " Houtoo.^^ They 

 breed in holes, and about May lay three or four dusky cream- 

 coloured eggs. Sexes undistinguishable ; and the young scarcely 

 differ except in the more downy texture of their feathers. Pri- 

 maries shed at the first moult. The story has found credence 

 that they nibble off the occasionally absent vanes of the long 

 middle tail-feathers ; but this notion has been contradicted. 



3. Structure other than skeletal. — The more important points 

 of their internal organization have been recorded by several ob- 

 servers t- CEsophagus wide ; proventriculus moderate ; stomach 

 small and oval, inner coat coriaceous, muscular wall only of 

 moderate thickness. Intestines narrow : caeca long, and situate 

 near the end of the gut ; cloaca large. Tongue lengthened, 

 bifid for half an inch, and feathered at the sides. Jardine says 

 of the muscles of the larynx that they appeared to him to resemble 

 in number and position those of the Corvidse (?) . 



Their syndactyle foot is moderately adapted for terrestrial 

 progression (Blyth). Tarsus scutellate ; mid anterior claw with 

 an expanded inner edge. Beak Corvine, margins denticulate ; 



* Ann. of Nat. Hist. 1841, vol. vi. p. 321. 



t Among these I may refer to : — Jardine's (/. c.) notice of tlie viscera 

 of Motiiotus Sicainsoni {Prionites bahamcnsis of Swain.) ; Giebel on the 

 tongue, ' Zeitsch. f. Gesam. Naturwiss.' Halle, 1858, p. 27, tab. i. fig. 37 

 (his figure in outline from above does not show the cleft tip so markedly 

 as in Jardine's woodcut) ; Macgillivray, ' Brit. Birds,' vol. ii. ; Blyth, 

 'Mag. Nat. Hist.' vol. ii. ; Nitzsch, ' Pterylographie,' &c. 



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