600 Mr. F. E. Bcddaid on some Points in 



in tl)e present commnnicatiou to lay a few new facts 

 before the readers of this Journal. These chiefly concern the 

 genera Hierococcyx, Rhamphococcyx , and Coccystes, with 

 regard to none of which have we at present any adequate 

 knowledge of such anatomical features as might serve to 

 indicate their relationship to allied genera. Some seventeen 

 years ago I made an attempt* to arrange the Cuckoos 

 according to the modifications in the feather-tracts^ the 

 structure of the syrinx, and the Garrodian leg-muscle formula. 

 A subsequent investigation of the genera Scythi'upsf and 

 Carpococcyx X served to support the arrangement which I 

 originally proposed ; and the new facts which I have noAv to 

 record point in precisely the same direction. 



Apart from subsidiary differences, the Cuckoos in their 

 pterylosis present us with two chief modifications. In one 

 series of birds the ventral feather-tracts are single on each 

 side of the body. In the other series the same tracts are 

 divided, and thus a more complicated pterylosis is arrived at. 

 This more complicated pterylosis characterizes Centropus, 

 Carpococcyx, Scythrops, Eudynamis, Phcpjiicophaes and Croto- 

 phaya ; the simpler ventral pterylosis, in which the tract is 

 not divided again after its first separation into two branches on 

 tlie neck, is to be found in Cuculus, Piciya, and other forms. 

 In Hierococcyx vari^/s the pterylosis is entirely upon the 

 Cuculine plan. Each ventral tract is undivided. On the 

 abdomen the rows of feathers constituting each tract are less 

 in immber than m the pectoral region. There are three 

 distinct rows of feathers, each at some little distance 

 from its neighbours. This arrangement into three rows 

 is precisely Avliat occurs in the genus Cuculus. In both the 

 genera referred to these three rows approach each other 

 some little way before the tract ends at the cloaca, and two 



* " On the Stnictural Characters and Classification of the Cuckoos," 

 P. Z. S. 1885, p. 1G8. 



t "On the Anatomy of an Australian Cuckoo, Scythrops novce-hol- 

 landice;' P. Z. S. 1898, p. 44. 



X "On the Anatomy of the Radiated Fniit-Cuekoo. Carpococcyx 

 radiatus," Ibis, 1001, p. 200. 



