168 BIRDS. 



at its point ; feet for swimming ; toes pahnated, or united by a 

 membrane. 



IV. GRALLJ3. Bill almost cylindrical ; legs formed for wading ; thighs 



half naked. 



V. GALLING. Bill convex, with the upper mandible arched over the 

 under ; feet formed for walking ; toes rough below. 



VI. PASSERES. Bill conical, pointed ; legs formed for hopping, slen- 

 der, and with the toes divided. 



If in his arrangement of birds Linnaeus deserves the acknow- 

 ledgment of all the future students of ornithology, his determi- 

 nation of the genera, and his creation of terms to make his descrip- 

 tions more certain, render his labours of double value. The 

 terminology of Linnaeus was extended by Forster in his Enchi- 

 ridion, and improved by Illiger. The thirteenth edition of the 

 Systema Natures by J. F. Gmelin, including many new species, 

 appeared in 1788. 



Linnaeus was followed as a systematic writer by Brisson in 

 1760. This able writer's System of Ornithology, still in estima- 

 tion for its minute accuracy of description, is in six quarto vo- 

 lumes, containing 220 engravings. About 1BOO species of birds 

 are described, grouped into twenty-six orders and 113 genera, 

 the characters of which are taken from the feet, bill, and fea- 

 thers. J. Ch. Schaeffer published in 1774 his Elementa Orni- 

 thologica, in which birds are divided into two families, Nudi- 

 pedes and Plumipedes ; and J. Ant. Scopoli, in his Introduc- 

 tio ad Historiam Naturalem, 1777, also arranges the birds in 

 two great families, the first of which he terms Retipedes, or 

 with the skin of the legs divided by small polygonal scales ; and 

 the second Scutipedes, or those which have the fore part of the 

 legs covered with segments or unequal rings terminated on each 

 side in a longitudinal furrow. The first part of Buffon ? s work 

 which treats of birds appeared in 1771, distinguished by the 

 same want of arrangement which characterized his previous vo- 

 lumes, and the same enthusiastic eloquence. The work was 

 completed in 1783. 



Among the systematic writers who have followed Linnaeus, our 

 countryman, Latham, deserves a distinguished place. In 1781 

 he published a General Synopsis of Birds, followed by two supple- 

 ments, the one in 1787, and the other in 1801, and each genus 

 is illustrated by at least one coloured figure. His Index Orni- 



