BIRD GROUPS 



beauty and variety in the nightingale, is a character of 

 birds which is not found in any reptile or indeed in any 

 other vertebrate, in spite of Mr. Ruskin's singing ser- 

 pents ! There are more kinds of birds in the world 

 than of any other group of vertebrated animals, very 

 many more. They are the insects among vertebrates 

 by reason of these numbers, and of their gaudy hues, 

 also unequalled in generality of occurrence and in 

 variety among other vertebrates. 



In spite of their general uniformity, the " aery cara- 

 van " can be divided up into a number of distinct groups, 

 which, however, have by no means the value of the 

 major, or even of the minor, subdivisions of the mammalia 

 or of the reptiles. The range of structural variation 

 among birds is possibly about equal to that of the 

 lizards among reptiles, or of the frogs and toads among 

 Amphibians. We may acknowledge the following 

 groups, to which we shall not apply the term orders, as 

 that would suggest an equivalence with the orders in 

 the mammalia : (i) Passer es, all the small perching 

 birds, such as crows, thrushes, wagtails, birds of para- 

 dise, swallows, etc., etc. ; (2) Pici, that is, woodpeckers, 

 barbets, and toucans ; (3) Alcedines, including king- 

 fishers only ; (4) Colii, an assemblage of very limited 

 extent, confined to the African mouse birds or colies ; 



(5) Trogones, the American and Afro-Asiatic trogons ; 



(6) Coracia, i.e. rollers, bee-eaters, motmots, todies, 

 puff birds ; (7) hornbills and hoopoes constitute the 

 group Bucerotes ; (8) Macrochires, humming-birds and 

 swifts ; (9) Caprimulgi, goat suckers ; (10) Striges, or 

 owls ; (n) Psittaci, or parrots ; (12) Cuculi, cuckoos ; 

 (13) Musophagi, touracous ; (14) Opisthocomi, the 

 Hoatzin only ; (15) Galli, the gallinaceous birds, phea- 

 sants, curassows, turkeys, megapodes, guinea fowls, 

 quails, etc. ; (16) Columbce, pigeons ; (17) Pterocletes, 

 sand grouse ; (18) Turnices> the quail-like birds Turnix 



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