Recently published Ornithological Works. 459 



Passercs, as adopted in the Check-list of the American 

 Ornithologists' Union, and, after a " concise sketch " of the 

 osteology of one or more of the representatives of each of 

 these groups, proposes to show how they may be arranged in 

 a more natural linear order. Many of these types (Lanius, 

 Sturnella, Eremophila, Chamcea, &c.) have been studied in 

 former papers, details are now given on most of the remainder. 

 The revised table (op. cit. p. 107) is perhaps, in some respects, 

 an improvement upon that of the Check-list; but, as is 

 unfortunately the case in most of this author's elaborate 

 memoirs, no precise characters are given by which the twenty 

 families may be distinguished . If Dr. Shufeldt would furnish 

 these he would do a good deed. 



As regards the elevation of Corvida? to the highest place in 

 the Passerine series, in maintaining which Dr. Shufeldt 

 follows Professor Newton, we think that the wing-structure 

 of the Crows is hardly reconcilable with this view. Surely 

 the families in which the primary quills are nearly (or quite) 

 reduced to nine in number must be allowed to be of a 

 higher degree of development than those which retain ten 

 or eleven fully formed primaries. It may be quite true that 

 the Raven has a " relatively larger brain " than that of other 

 Passeres, that its young have " substantially the plumage of 

 their parents/' and even that it is " a far more intelligent 

 bird than any species of Sialia " ; but its wing-structure is, 

 to our mind, a more significant character, and the Corvine 

 wing-structure is of a " low type." 



97. Shufeldt on the Position of Chamgea. 



[On the Position of Chamcea in the System. By K. W. Shufeldt. 

 Journ. of Morph. iii. p. 475.] 



The much-vexed question of the position of Chamcea in 

 the natural series is here discussed by Dr. Shufeldt at full 

 length, after examination of a goodly series of specimens of 

 this form and its supposed allies, contributed by sympathizing 

 friends and correspondents. The ultimate results arrived at 

 are not very concisely given. But it would seem that the 

 " general form of Chamcea is more like that of a Bush-Tit 



