94 SHUFELDT. (Vou. III. 
Chickadees are true Titmice, and in my opinion more highly 
organized birds than the Zurdide, as they have proportion- 
ately larger brains, and in many cases build nests of a high 
order of architectural design; and, according to Coues, “the 
young closely resemble the parents, and there are no obvious 
seasonal changes of plumage.’! Sub-genus Lophophanes, in- 
cluding the Crested Titmice, should be made to constitute the 
genus Lophophanes, as these birds show a very distinct structure 
from the Chickadees, entitling them fully to generic rank. In- 
deed, in such a species as the Gray Titmouse (P. znxornatus 
griseus), 1 found, among other distinctive characters, that it had 
a vomer of an oblanceolate form, being fozzted in front. This 
extraordinary fact even constitutes a marked departure from the 
type that bone assumes among the Passeres generally. Huxley 
laid it down as a law that in the A®githognathous birds “the 
vomer is a broad bone, abruptly truncated in front, and deeply 
cleft behind, embracing the rostrum of the sphenoid between its 
forks.” 2 Figures 7, 8,9, and 10 of the Plates to the present 
memoir, give superior views of the skulls in Crested Tits, Tits, 
Chamea, and the Bush Titmice. 
Nuthatches (see Fig. 11), as the remaining Family of the Par- 
id@, are possessed of a passerine type of skeleton characterized 
by anumber of features peculiarly its own. Szt¢a c. aculeata, for 
instance, has the vomer very small, though of the usual passerine 
form; its Jacrymal bones remain free throughout life, occupy- 
ing, on either side, a position in front of the pars plana, as in 
certain Corvide,; the interorbital septum is commonly entire, 
and rather dense; specimens may be met with (I have one before 
me) wherein the ilia meet at a point over the sacral crista, as 
in Chamea, and the hinder ends of the ischia are drawn out into 
unusually slender processes; finally, specimens of this Nuthatch 
occur in which the “notches” of the sternum are strikingly small. 
Osteologically, I should say that such a sittatine form as we 
have here, is not very closely affined to the genus Lophophanes, 
and we may be assured that good, strong sub-family lines define 
their kinship. 
Passing to the next family, the Certhzid@, I find I have said 
in my Chamea essay all that I have to in reference to these 
1 Cougs, E., Key to North American Birds, 2d ed., p. 263. 2 Tbid., p. 450. 
