ORDER PELECANI. 61 



Australia, breeding on Bedout Island, a larger form ; and F. a. iredalei Mathews, 

 from Aldabra, Western Indian Ocean, a smaller form with a very smal bill. The 

 species has also been recorded from the South Atlantic Ocean, but series are not 

 available to determine the subspecies. 



ORDER PELECANI. 



This order, consisting of large seabirds, with long more or less hooked bills 

 with obsolete nostrils, long wings, stiff wedge-shaped tails and webbed feet, all 

 four toes being connected with large webs, the first large and the fourth longest, 

 is separable into three superfamilies. These are the Phalacrocoracoidea, including 

 the Cormorants and Darters, the Pelecanoidea for the Pelicans, and the Suloidea 

 for the Gannets. The feet formation in all these agree fairly closely, though the 

 bill has varied somewhat considerably while the size of the birds has altered also. 

 The first named contains the smallest species (but still large birds), with long necks 

 and slender elongate bodies, long wings and long wedge-shaped tail and short legs 

 and feet. The Pelicans are the largest forms, with extraordinarily long bills with huge 

 characteristic gular pouch, short necks, very heavy stout bodies, long wings, short 

 rounded tail and large stout legs and feet. The Gannets are intermediate in size, 

 with long thick necks, stout bodies, long wedge-shaped tail, strong legs and feet. 



The diagnostic feature of the group is the superficial one of the webbing of the 

 feet ; there is no characteristic internal feature that will define the group succinctly. 

 The superficial differences of the bill are so great that similar differences are easily 

 observed in the skull. The palate is desmognathous, and the nasals holorhinal, 

 while there are no basipterygoid processes (rudiments are recorded in Pdecanus 

 only as yet). The lachrymals vary in size and form. The sternum is somewhat 

 peculiar in the formation of the carina which is produced forward, decreasing rapidly 

 backward and disappearing about the middle of the corpus sterni. The furcula is 

 connected by ligaments with the keel of the sternum, being even anchylosed in 

 Pdecanus. The cervical vertebrae vary in number in the three groups, also showing 

 little peculiarities in each. Both carotids are present, the syrinx tracheo-bronchial 

 but variable, intrinsic muscles being present or absent in the different groups. The 

 digestive system does not seem to have been studied in detail, being periccelous and 

 orthocoelous in general, and cseca small. The leg muscle formula is variable in the 

 different groups as is the presence or absence of the biceps slip, and the arrangement 

 of the biceps itself. The oil gland is present and tufted but the number of orifices 

 is variable, the aftershaft superficially absent and the wing aquincubital. The 

 pterylosis is very uniform and the down very close, the young born naked. Many 

 fossils from Tertiary strata have been recorded as Steganopodes, using that term 

 in the broad sense. Lydekker has referred Argillornis Owen from the London Clay 

 to the neighbourhood of this group, but Furbringer would class it with the Ichthy- 

 ornithes. Similarly Furbringer would include Remiornis (which Gadow considered 

 Struthious) and Chenornis which was supposed to be Anserine. Such divergence 

 of opinion suggests the unsuitability of depending on osteological characters alone. 

 Marsh recorded Graculavus from the Cretaceous, concluding it could be determined 

 as not only Steganopodous but even referable to the Phalacrocoracine branch. 

 Odontopteryx Owen has been regarded as a Steganopod, but Andrews showed that 

 there were important Anserine-like features, though Steganopod -like items were 

 still recognisable. Prophaethon shrubsolei Andrews from the London Clay, considered 

 as ancestral to Phaethon, seems to show more ancestral Suline features and would 

 be better classed here. 



SUPERFAMILY PHALACROCORACOIDEA. 



Only two families are recognised, one with hooked bills, long wings, short stoutish 

 necks, wedge-shaped tail of very stiff feathers and typically Steganopod feet ; the 



