14 



AN AUSTRALIAN BIRD BOOK. 



1 G*King Quail (Chestnut-bellied, Least, Dwarf, Swamp), Ex- 

 4 calfactoria chinensis li7ieata, Philippines, Sumatra to A. 



exc. W.A. ; sub-species of Chinese Quail. Nom. r. swamps 

 Back dark-brown; breast blue-gray; abdomen chestnut; 

 throat black, white bands conspicuous; 11 oz. ; f., dark- 

 brown, spotted black; throat whitish; under barred 

 black. Weed-seeds, insects. 

 F. 11. Numididae, Guinea-Fowls, 23 sp. E. 



4.5 



of bone down the breast. Thus they belong to the sub-class, the 

 members of which have a raft-like breast bone. The other living 

 birds were placed in the sub-class the members of which have 

 a keel on the breast bone for the attachment of the wing- 

 muscles. 



Recently, however, Pycraft, a leading ornithologist, has pro- 

 posed to base the division into sub-classes on the characters of 

 the bones of the palate instead of those of the breast-bone. Thus, 

 he places the sixth family of birds — the Tinamous, of South 

 America — with the ratite birds, to form his primitive group — 

 Palaeognathae ("old jaw"), while the members of the old sub- 

 class Carinatae, minus the Tinamous, constitute his second divi- 

 sion, the Neognathac ("new jaw"). 



Mr. Gregory Mathews, the first part of whose projected great 

 work on Australian Birds has just come to hand, has followed 

 Dr. Bowdler Sharpe in accepting this classification, so we must 

 follow too, as Mathews' work will probably be our standard for 



