2 ..-, 1 1 *:./: ' JV^ TURAL HISTOR Y. 



chapters. The eagerness with which, up to the present time, the feet of birds have been seized upon as 

 of primary importance in their classification, can hardly be wondered at, when the remarkable diversity 

 in regard to these organs exhibited by the different orders of birds is taken into consideration. In the 

 case of an Eagle, for instance, what can be more admirable than the proportions of the feet and 

 talons for the capture of its quarry ? And the same holds good with all the Accipitres, or birds of 

 prey, not to mention the Zygodactyle Woodpeckers, which have been already discussed, while the 

 long toes of the Kails, the webbed feet of the Ducks and Gulls, are all indications of a perfect adapta- 

 bility of these organs to the habits of the birds. The Passerine birds are divided into two great 

 sections, which are called Passeres acromyodi and Passeres mesomyodi, from peculiarities in their 

 voice organs, the first section containing the songsters of the world, the second containing the 

 songless birds. 



SECTION A,- ACROMYODI, SINGING BIRDS. SUB-ORDER I, TURDIFORMES, 



THRUSH-LIKE BIRDS. 



Geographical distribution also helps to distinguish these two leading groups of the Perching birds : 

 for the Acromyodian Passeres are chiefly inhabitants of the Old World, as the Mesomyodian Passeres 



are of the New. The principal character by which the 

 leading groups are distinguished is the wing, and the classi- 

 fication based on this feature, which is easy to understand, 

 will be the one adopted in the present work. The first 

 group bears the name of Turdiformes, or Thrush-like 

 Passeres, and in all these birds the wing has ten primary 

 feathers, the first being always markedly reduced in 

 size. The leading group of these birds is known as 

 the Coliomorphce, or Crow-like birds, and contains five 

 families : Crows (Corvidce), Birds of Paradise (Para- 

 disiidce), Orioles (Orioliidce), Drongos (DicruridcK), and 

 Wood-Shrikes (Prionopidce). All the members of these 

 five families have the chin-angle (angulus menti) produced 

 very far forwards (B), so as to extend beyond a line drawn 

 perpendicularly down the front edge of the nostril (A). 

 What is meant is shown in the accompanying illustra- 

 tion. It is true that in some of the Jays this prominence of the chin-angle is not so marked, but still 

 sufficiently so to determine that they are Crows ; while some Creepers (Certhiidce) have the same 

 character of bill, but then their long curved beaks and spiny tails prevent their being mistaken 

 for any of the Crow family or its allies. 



THE FIRST FAMILY OF THRUSH-LIKE PERCHING BIRDS. THE CROWS (Corvid<e). 



These are found nearly all over the globe in some form or other ; that is to say, either as Crows 

 or as Jays, the latter predominating chiefly in South America, where no true Crow is met with ; and 

 in most of the Pacific Islands no member of the family at all is found. Even, the deserts of Central 

 Asia have their own representatives in the form of Desert Choughs, belonging to the genus Podoces, 

 while nowhere is the family more strongly developed than in the islands of the Malay Archipelago. 



The habits of many of the Crows change with the localities they inhabit, and a species will 

 be wild and unsociable in one place, while in another the same bird will be tame and confiding ; and 

 although in England the Crows, with the exception of the Rook and Jackdaw, live only in country 

 districts, species precisely similar in habits and appearance are found in other parts of the world, in- 

 habiting towns and doing the duty of scavengers. 



The Choughs are peculiar Crows, distinguished by the position of the nostril, which is placed low in 

 the upper mandible of the beak and generally hidden by a tuft of bristly feathers. They are to be 

 considered as belonging to a separate sub-family (FregilincK). The rest of the Crows are placed in 

 the sub-family Corvince. 



