ON THE TRACHEA OF SELEUCIDES. 335 



vialine group, where I have already * placed it. In spite of M. Milne- 

 Ed vvards's remarks t, I see no reason for doubting the value of the 

 schizorhinal character of the nasal bones as a mark of the genetic affinities 

 of birds, especially when, as in the present case, other facts point in the 

 same direction. 



I should be inclined therefore to consider (1) that Mesites, Eurypyga, 

 and Rliinoclietus have all sprung from some common ancestor, which must 

 have been a generalized Pluvialine form provided with powder-down 

 tracts ; (2) that of the forms which this common stock gave rise to, all 

 have become extinct save the three in question, which, having become 

 isolated in three widely separated localities, have each acquired certain 

 special characters not found in the others ; (3) that, judging at least 

 from the pterylosis, the Malagash Mesites is perhaps more nearly related 

 to the New-Caledonian Rhinochetus than to the Neotropical Eurypyga. 



58. NOTE ON A PECULIARITY IN THE TRACHEA OF P.Z.S.1882, 

 THE TWELVE-WIRED BIRD-OF-PARADISE (SELEU- P * m 

 CIDES NIGRA)4 



THE death (from conjestion of the lungs, with resulting haemorrhage, 

 and thickening of the walls of the intrathoracic air-cells) on Feb. 22nd 

 last of the male Seleucides nigra, purchased by the Society on March 19, 

 1881 , has given me the opportunity of observing a peculiarity in the 

 construction of its trachea of a nature unlike any thing of the kind yet 

 known to me. The windpipe, for the greater part of its course, has the 

 normal avian structure, the tracheal rings, which are ossified and, as 

 usual, notched both before and behind, being of the ordinary form, and 

 separated by but narrow intervals from each other. For a space, 

 however, of about 1 inch above the largely developed short pair of 



* Ibis, 1881, p. 4, and P. Z. S. 1881, p. 644. 



t The greater or lesser size of the beak will not account for the schizorhinal or 

 holorhinal character of the nares, as suggested by M. Milne-Edwards. Else why should 

 the big-billed Platalea, Ibises, Didunculus, Laridag, Alcidae, be all schizorhinal, whilst 

 the slender-billed Eails, Colymbidae, and such Tubinares as Puffinus and Procellaria, 

 to say nothing of such forms as the Meropidae, Dendrocolaptidae, and Nectariniidae, 

 are all equally holorhinal ? Nor can I admit with M. Milne-Edwards that the Ptero- 

 clidae are related to the Gallinse, or the Ibididse to Tantalus, there being plenty of 

 collateral evidence to prove the reverse. Hence any argument based on such assumed 

 affinities also fails. 



| Proc. Zool. Soc. 1882, pp. 333-335. Kead Mar. 21, 1882. 



See P. Z.S. 1881, p. 450. 



