15 12 THE PERCHING BIRDS 



circle of feathers of velvety black and emerald, completely concealing the rest of the 

 body when viewed from the front. 



The remaining genera of the family, such as Phonygama of New Guinea and 

 North Australia, Manucodia of North Australia and the adjacent Papuan islands, 

 and Lycocorax of the Moluccan and Papuan islands, must here be passed without 

 further mention. 



THE BOWER BIRDS 

 Family PTILONORHTNCHID^ 



By no means easy of definition, the bower birds, most of which are, however, 

 characterized by building the structures from which they take their name, have 

 given rise to some difference of opinion among ornithologists as to their affinities, 

 and they have been included in the preceding family, although they are now placed 

 by Dr. Sharpe in his catalogue of the birds in the Museum of the Royal College of 

 Surgeons between the birds of paradise and the starlings. While the so-called 

 regent bird approximates to the former group in the nature of the feathers on the 

 head, and the gorgeous coloration of its plumage, the true bower birds are more 

 thrush-like in appearance. The group is mainly peculiar to Australia, although 

 one Australian genus extends to the Papuan islands, and another genus (Ambly- 

 ornis] , with a single species, inhabits New Guinea only. 



They all have the base of the beak fully feathered, and the foot of the normal 

 Passerine type. In the position of the flexure of the lower mandible, immediately 

 below the aperture of the nostrils, the skull resembles that of the birds of paradise; 

 but, in a slight backward protection of the hinder extremity of the mandible, they 

 approximate to the starlings, in which it is more developed, while the flexure is 

 further back. 



The satin bower bird (Ptilonorhynchus holosericeus) is the type of a 



genus characterized by the short, convex, and laterally-compressed 



beak, in which the nostrils are basal and concealed by the silky feathers 



of the forehead; the wings being pointed, the tail somewhat rounded, and the feet 



stout and furnished with moderately-long claws. These bower birds belong to the 



eastern and northern districts of Australia. 



The localities frequented by the satin bower birds are the luxuriant and thickly- 

 foliaged brushes stretching along the coast of New South Wales. Their popular 

 name owes its origin to their extraordinary habit of constructing what the colonists 

 commonly call "runs," which are used by the birds as a playing house, and are con- 

 structed in avenue form, built of pieces of stick or grass and adorned with stones, 

 bright-colored shells, and even bleached bones, as well as the blue tail feathers of 

 certain parrakeets. The natives are so well acquainted with the propensity of these 

 birds for carrying off any attractive object, that they always search the runs for any 

 small article that may have been dropped in the brush; and in one Gould found 

 a small neatly- worked stone tomahawk, together with some slips of blue cotton 

 rags, which the birds had doubtless picked up at a deserted encampment of the 



