192 ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIBRARY. 



Nest. Generally none, the eggs being laid upon the bare 

 ground. Occasionally a slight foundation of dead sedge, or a 

 little moss, is observable. 



Eggs. Two in number. Ground-colour dark olive, or dark 

 chocolate-brown, the latter sometimes so deep in tint that 

 the spots are scarcely discernible. Sometimes the eggs are 

 covered all over with small black dots, in other instances the 

 spots are larger and almost form blotches. On one egg in the 

 British Museum there is a large blotch of brown. The under- 

 lying spots are blackish, or greyish-black, and are about as 

 distinct as the overlying ones. Axis 2-6-3-05 inches, diam. 

 1-7-1-9. 



THE GREBES. ORDER PODICIPEDIDIFORMES. 



The Grebes have the same remarkable projection of the cne- 

 mial process of the tibia as the Divers, and the same form of the 

 posterior process of the ilium described under the heading of the 

 last-mentioned birds. The palate is schizognathous, and the 

 cervical vertebrae are seventeen to twenty-one in number : the 

 anchylosed sacral vertebrae are preceded by a free vertebra, in 

 front of which are four anchylosed dorsal vertebrae ; the median 

 xiphoid process of the sternum is abruptly truncated, so that 

 the lateral processes extend behind it. The spinal feather 

 tract is not defined on the neck, and the ambiens and femoro- 

 caudal muscles are wanting, 



The bill is long and pointed, and resembles that of the Divers, 

 from which the Grebes are at once distinguished by their lobed 

 toes, and by their obsolete tail, which is not visible. 



THE TIPPETED GREBES. GENUS LOPH^THYIA. 

 Lophaithyia, Kaup. Nat. Syst. p. 72 (1829). 



Type, L. cristata (Linn.). 



Although I cannot follow the conclusions of my American 

 colleagues in their determination of the generic names of 

 Colymbus for the Grebes, and Urinator for the Divers, I must 

 admit that their conclusion that the Little Grebe (Podicipes 

 minor, auct.), must be considered to be the type of the genus 

 Podicipes^ seems to me to be indubitable. 



