230 



43, 3, hardly as large as a thrush, with cinereous plumage, more 

 or less shaded with fawn colour ; prettily variega;ted with little nar- 

 row longitudinal black streaks, and with transverse vermicular grey 

 lines; a suite of white spots on the scapulars, and six or eight 

 feathers in each tuft ; a beautiful little bird*. 



Certain foreign species, of large size, have the legs naked as well 

 as the toes-i". 



ORDER II. 



PASSERINE. 

 This order is the most numerous of the whole class. Its character, at 

 first, seems purely negative, for it embraces all birds which are neither 

 swimmers, waders, climbers, rapacious, nor gallinaceous. By comparing 

 them with each other, however, we soon perceive a great mutual simila- 

 rity of structure, and particularly such insensible transitions from one 

 genus to another, that it is extremely difficult to separate them into sub- 

 divisions. 



They neither have the violence of the birds of prey, nor the fixed re- 

 gimen of the gallinacese, nor of the water-birds; insects, fruit, and grain 

 constitute their food, which consists the more exclusively of grain, in 

 proportion to the largeness of their bill, and of insects, as it is the more 

 slender. Those indeed which have strong bills pursue the smaller birds. 



Their stomach is a muscular gizzard. They have, generally, two very 

 small c^ca. Among them we find the singing birds, and the most com- 

 plicated inferior larynx. 



The proportional length of their wings, and their power of flight, are 

 as various as their habits. 



The adult sternum usually has but one notch on each side of its lower 

 edge. There are two, however, in Coracias, Alcedo, and Merops, and it 

 is totally wanting in Cypselus and Trochilus. 



Our first division is founded upon the feet; we then have recourse to 

 the bill. 



The first and most numerous division comprehends those genera in 

 which the external toe is united to the inner by one or two phalanges only. 



• We can find no difference l)etween the Str. zorca of Cetti, the Str. carnioUca of 

 Scopoli, the Str. pulchella of Pallas, and the Scops; these gentlemen must have con- 

 sidered their birds as distinct, because Linnasus described the tuft of his as consisting 

 of a single feather. Add the St. midipede, {Buh. nudipedes), Vieill. Amer. 22. — The 

 Str. atricapUla, T. Col. 45, or Str. crucigera, Spix, IX.— The Str. noctula, T. Col. 99. 



t The Str. kelupa, T. Col. 74, and the Str. Leschenauldi, Id. Col. 20, will be found 

 at mostt onn but one species. 



