S UBCLA MA TORES— S UGA R-BIRD 92 1 



SUBCLAMATORES, the name proposed in 1893 (Gadow, 

 Thier-reich, Vogel, System. Th. pp. 273-276) for a division of 

 Passeres formed by the Family Eurylxmidse (Broadbill, p. 57). 



SUBOSCINES, proposed, like the last {torn. cit. pp. 272, 277, 

 278), in place of Pseudoscines (p. 743). 



SUGAR-BIRD, the English name commonly given in the West 

 India Islands to the various members of the genus Certhiola,^ 

 generally regarded as belonging to the Family Cmrebidas (cf. GuiT- 

 GUIT, p. 40 1),^ from their habit of frequenting the curing-houses where 

 sugar is kept, apparently attracted thither by the swarms of flies. 

 These little birds on account of their pretty plumage and their 

 familiarity are usually favourites. They often come into dAvelling- 

 houses, where they preserve great coolness, hopping gravely from 

 one piece of furniture to another and carefully exploring the 

 surrounding objects with intent to find a spider or insect. In their 

 figure and motions they remind a northern naturalist of a Nuthatch 

 (p. 647), while their coloration — black, yellow, olive, grey and white 

 — recalls to him a Titmouse. They generally keep in pairs and build 

 a domed but untidy nest, laying therein three eggs, white blotched 

 with rusty-red. Apart from all this the genus presents some points 

 of great interest. Mr. Sclater (Cat. B. Br. Mus. xi. pp. 36-47) 

 recognizes 18 "species," therein following Mr. Ridgway (Proc. U. S. 

 Nat. Mus. 1885, pp. 25-30), of which 3 are continental with a joint 

 range extending from southern Mexico to Peru, Bolivia and south- 

 eastern Brazil, while the remaining 15 are peculiar to certain of the 

 Antilles,^ and several of them to one island only. Thus 0. caboti is 

 limited, so far. as is known, to Cozumel (off Yucatan), C. tricolor to 

 Old Providence, C.fiaveola (the type of the genus) to Jamaica, and 

 so on, while islands that are in sight of one another are often 

 inhabited by different "species." Further research is required; 

 but even now the genus furnishes an excellent example of the 

 effect of isolation in breaking up an original form, while there is 

 comparatively little differentiation among the individuals which 

 inhabit a large and continuous area. The non-appearance of this 

 genus in Cuba is very remarkable. 



I 

 ^ American ornithologists have lately taken to use the name Cxreba (or Ccereba, 

 as they and others spell it) in place of Certhiola, but Mr. Sclater {Ibis, 1893, p. 

 247) successfully defends the older practice. 



2 The (hiitguit of Hernandez [Rer. Medic. N. Hisp. Thes. p. 56), a name said 

 by him to be of native origin, can hardly be determined, though thought by 

 Montbeillard {Hist. Nat. Ois. v. p. 529) to be what is now known as Gxrcba cmrulea, 

 but that of later writers is C. eyanea. The name is probably from the bird's 

 note, like Quit (p. 761), applied in Jamaica to several species. 



3 More recently, in 1889, Mr. Cory {Birds of the West Indies, pp. 61-67) 

 admitted only twelve species as Antillean. 



