472 NATin.il. /I I STORY OF lilUDS. 



posed in a horizontal fork. It is a slight stnictiin' made of fine ixrassc!!, iiit('rs|>crsed 

 more or less with the lilussoms of trees, the whole tlisposed in a circular form, and 

 fitted between two twigs. The entire base of the nest is without support, and so thin 

 is the slight structure that the eggs might almost be seen from below." 



The pij)ras, or manakins, I'li'Kiu-t:, like the foregoing family, have ex.aspidean 

 tarsi, but the outer and middle toes are connected for a distance of two joints, hence 

 the feet are syiidactylous. Furthermore, they are hetcromerous, as already men- 

 tioned. The pipras are mostly small birds, and nearly confined to South America, 

 only a few species being found in Central America and Mexico. The se.xes are very 

 different in color, the females usually being dull greenish, while the males are mostly 

 very gorgeously colored, generally of a deep glossy black relieved by the most brilliant 

 scarlet, yellow, or sky-blue. Their figure is somewhat thick-set and the tail is generally 

 short and square, but forms are found with very extraordinary tail ornaments, and, on 

 the whole, the tail and wings seem to be the most variable parts, while the bill is of a 

 very uniform shajie throughout the family, being short, somewhat vaulted, ami broad 

 at base, the tip of the upjier maiulible lieing bent over the under one and notched behind 

 the jioint. 



The members of the genus Jleteropelmn are somewhat different from the general 

 style of the pij)ras, being larger, and both sexes similarly dull colored. If. vcra-jxicis 

 is peculiar to Mexico and Central America. Among the more conspicuous forms may 

 be mentioned the Pipra Jilicau(l<t from the Amazon, having the tail-feathers pro- 

 duced into long hair-like, but stiff, threads; the exquisitely colored /•'. suiioissima 

 from Demcrara, of a deep velvety black, against which is set off in the strongest con- 

 trast imaginable the glossy sky-blue of the rum]), the bright orange of the abdomen, 

 and the white forehead slightly tinged with beryl blue. The manakins proper, the typi- 

 cal species of wliich, }r<inac>(s martficn.% is figured on the ])late opposite this page, are 

 to be mentioned on account of the beard-like elongation of their chin-feathers, and the 

 attenuation and falcation of the primaries. The species figured is black, gray, and 

 white, exactly as shown in the drawing, the gr.ay being a little more bluisli ; and hails 

 from northern South America, while M. ccuulei from Central America and Mexico has 

 the posterior half of the body beautifully tinged with yellow. In the members of the 

 genus Chiroxiphia we meet a different style of coloration, the back usually being 

 light blue, while the head is adorned with a crimson crown i)atch, the central tail- 

 feathers are often more or less lengthened, and the frontal and nasal feathers show a 

 tendency towards the velvety antrorse tufts, which reach their highest develo))ment 

 in Mdsius coronidatiis and in Antilophia (/ithuto, both velvety black, the former with 

 top of the head and the tuft yellow, the latter with the same parts, including the 

 upper neck and anterior back gloriously crimson scarlet. Most curious in form and 

 color, however, is the genus Maclupropterns. The typical species are green with fiery 

 red crown, and the lower surface most curiously striped brown and whitish lengthwise. 

 The inner secondaries have the shafts thickened and hardened, ending in a pointed 

 claw, a structure carried out to an exces.sive degree in the more uniformily chestnuts 

 coloreil 3r. delicio.ifi Dr. Ph. L. Sclater, who originally described this species, gives 

 the following account of this odd sti ucturi' of wing: " Tlie ten ])rimaries are of the 

 ordinary formation of birds of this family. The first three secondaries are thick- 

 stemmed, and curved towards the body at a distance of about two thirds of their 

 length from the base. The fourth and fifth show this structure to a greater degree, 

 with s.ame corresponding alteration in the barb on each side, as may be seen from Fig. 



