OWLS. .^25 



its margins. The tongue is soft, fleshy, narrow, sagit- 

 tate and papillate at the base, marked above with a 

 central longitudinal groove, horny beneath towards the 

 end, its extremity narrowed and bifid. The aperture 

 of the glottis is defended behind by numerous papillse 

 directed backwards. The fauces are very wide, as is 

 the oesophagus, which is nearly uniform in diameter, 

 having no crop-like dilatation anterior to the furcula. 

 It is encircled by inconspicuous muscular fibres, and its 

 inner membrane is smooth. At its lower part its walls 

 are much thickened, there being interposed betAveen its 

 outer and inner coats numerous cylindrical glandules, 

 having a central cavity, into which a viscid fluid is se- 

 creted, and from which it passes into the stomach. 

 The glandules completely surround the cavity of the 

 proventriculus, which has the appearance of being a 

 continuation of the oesophagus. The stomach is large, 

 ioundish, more or less compressed ; its fasciculi of mus- 

 cular fibres are usually separated from each other, and 

 converge towards two thin roundish tendons placed on 

 its opposite flattened sides. The inner coat is thin 

 but tough, its surface very soft, smooth, destitute of 

 rugse. The pylorus, which is placed close to the car- 

 diac orifice, is closed by a rim or sphincter, and has 

 no other valvular apparatus. The intestine is slen- 

 der, larger at the commencement, and continuing of 

 nearly the same diameter about a fourth of its length, 

 then gradually contracting to the rectum, at the com- 

 mencement of which are two coeca, much longer than 

 those of the falconine family, and enlarged towards the 

 end. The rectum is much wider, and at the end di- 

 lated into a globular or funnel-shaped cavity. 



