158 RINGOUSELS. 



I was greatly pleased to see little parties of 

 ringousels (my newly- discovered migrators) scat- 

 tered, at intervals, all along the Sussex Downs 

 from Chichester to Lewes. Let them come from 

 whence they will, it looks very suspicious that 

 they are cantoned along the coast in order to 

 pass the Channel when severe weather advances. 

 They visit us again in April, as it should seem, 

 in their return, and are not to-be found in the 

 dead of winter. It is remarkable that they are 

 very tame, and seem to have no manner of 

 apprehensions of danger from a person with a 

 gun. There are bustards on the wide Downs near 



culated to its anterior extremity an additional portion, 

 formed partly of bone with a horny covering. In shape 

 it is narrow, about 3-8ths of an inch in length, and extends 

 downwards and forwards, the sides curved upwards, the 

 distal extremity shaped like a scoop, somewhat pointed 

 and thin on both edges the proximal extremity ending in 

 two small processes, elongated upwards and backwards 

 above the articulation with the bone of the tongue, each 

 process having inserted upon it a slender muscle extending 

 backwards to the glottis, and attached to the os hyoides, 

 which muscles, by their contraction, extend and raise the 

 scoop-like point ; underneath the articulation of this horny 

 and grooved appendage is another small muscle, which is 

 attached at one extremity to the os hyoides, at the other 

 to the moveable piece, and, by its action, as an antagonist 

 to the upper muscles, bends the point downwards and 

 backwards ; while, therefore, the point of the beak presses 

 the shell from the body of the cone, the tongue, brought 

 forward by its own muscle (genio-hyoideus) is enabled, by 

 the additional muscles described, to direct and insert its 

 cutting scoop underneath the seed, and the food thus 

 dislodged is transferred to the mouth ; and when the 

 mandibles are separated laterally in this operation, the 

 bird has an uninterrupted view of the seed in the cavity, 

 with the eye on that side to which the under mandible is 

 curved." 



For further information consult Zoological Journal, vol. iv. 

 p. 459. W. J. 



