NANODES. venustus. . 
Blue-fronted Parrakeet. 
Family Psittacide. 
GENERIC CHARACTER. 
Bill entire; the lower mandible short, deep, thick, and rounded ; 
nostrils very large, fleshy, naked; wings pointed ; tarsi, toes, 
and claws very slender—the former manifestly longer than 
the hind toe; tail cuneated; the feathers narrow and lan- 
ceolate. Nob. 
Type.—Psittacus pulchellus.—Zool. Ill. 2, Pl. 73. 
SPECIFIC CHARACTER. 
Stdes of the head yellowish; front with a blue band; wing-covers 
and tail blue, the latter tipt with yellow; throat and breast 
deep green; belly yellow. 
Psittacus venustus. Linn. Trans. (Temm.) xiii. p. 121. 
chrysostomas. Kuhl. Nov. Act. p.51, Pl. 1. 
Nanodes venustus. Linn. Trans. (Vig. and Hors.) xv. 274. 
eg 
Tue Ground Parrakeets of Australia, of which this is one 
of the most beautiful, form a small but richly coloured 
group of birds, remarkable for the peculiar structure of 
their feet, which leads them to frequent the ground more 
than any of their family. In the form of their bill, wings, 
and tail, they exhibit a close resemblance, in miniature, to 
the Maccaws of the New World, and may justly be sup- 
posed to represent those birds in the Southern hemisphere. 
We received two specimens of the Blue-fronted Parra- 
keet, some years ago, from Van Dieman’s Land ; yet even 
there it is considered scarce; nor did we observe it in any 
of the collections in Paris. 
Assenting, in a great measure, to those general principles 
of arrangement which several eminent Ornithologists have 
proposed regarding this family, we nevertheless consider 
that the succession of affinities, and even the nature of the 
leading groups, are not yet correctly understood. In the 
present case, we would rather have seen Nanodes placed 
as a sub-genus to Pezoporus ; from which it merely differs 
in the comparative shortness of the feet. ‘The connexion 
between the two forms, moreover, is so close as not, in our 
judgment, to admit the intervention of Platyeercus, or any 
other group yet discovered. 
