120 



NATURAL HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



ingly would now relegate it to that order. It is doubtless an extremely generalized 

 form, the survival of a very ancient type, whence several groups may have sprung ; 

 and whenever the secret it has to tell shall be revealed, a considerable step in the phy- 

 logeny of birds can scarcely fail to follow." Nevertheless, the seriema is also evU 

 dently allied to the cranes, and until the question concerning its relationship to the 

 African secretary-bird be finally settled, we may provisionally keep it where it has 

 been placed by most authors ; though we confess the belief that it has passed the 

 dividing line, and should properly be placed with its African cousin among the ' birds 



FIG. 57. Cariama cristata, seriema. 



of prey,' both forming distinct families of a super-family named as above. The vis- 

 ceral anatomy is shown by Martin and Gadow to be essentially crane-like, correspond- 

 ing closely with the arrangement found in Psophia, the gizzard having one radiating 

 tendinous patch on each side, and the intestines give off two long caeca, characters 

 not shared by the Raptorial birds. The pterylosis, according to Nitzsch, has much 

 that is peculiar about it, but it most closely approaches that of Psophia and Grus. 

 The oil gland is entirely naked, even on the mamilla. But the osteology, on the other 

 hand, tends toward the Raptores. Not only the sternal apparatus shows an approach 

 in that direction, but especially the palate, which even Huxley himself admits is not 



