236 PROF. W. K. PARKEE ON THE 



XII. — On the Morphology of the Young q/'Turnix rostrata. 



In the region round about the keel-less tribes of birds there lie some Families that 

 eome in between these large arrested and degraded types and the numerous existing 

 Families and Subfamilies of Gallinaceous birds. One Family only of the great general 

 Gallinaceous group, the Pigeons, has shot up into the higher type of arboreal birds ; 

 they are " Altrices," the high -builders, with tender young. Between them and the true 

 " Alectoromorphse " (Phasianidse, Cracidse, Megapodidae, &c.) come in the Sand-Grouse— 

 birds that are Prsecoces and exhibit a curious mixture of the Pigeon and the Grouse ; 

 they have the intestines of the Grouse and the general form and the sternum of a 

 Pigeon, but belong to the zoological level of the Grouse. 



Between the Cracida? and the Batitse we have the nearly extinct Opisthocomidaa ; this 

 type is on the same ornithological platform as the Tinaniidse. The so-called " Button 

 Quails " or Hemipods (Turnicidse) come in hetween the dwarf kinds of Phasianida3, 

 the Quails (Cotumix), and the semi-struthious Tinamous. The ancientness, or the 

 newness, of all these closely related birds may be determined and measured by their 

 potency in genera and species. 



The extremes, therefore, in this respect are the Hoatzin (Oplsthocomus) on one hand, 

 one species for one family, and the " Alectoropods " among the true Fowls on the other, 

 the high-heeled Gallinacea? ; the main family, Phasianidse, having subdivisions that may 

 be called Phasianinse proper, Tetraoninse, Meleagrinse, and Numidiinse. 



The Turnicidse are few in number, are small in size, and are confined to the Eastern 

 Regions ; whilst Oplsthocomus and the Tinamous are Western types — Neotropical indeed. 



Now, as I showed long ago, the Hemipods are not merely a link between the Quails 

 and the Tinamous ; they also approach, on one hand, to the Sand-Grouse and Plovers, and 

 on the other to the archaic types of Passerine birds. They are not ready-made links 

 to help the Ornithologist to tie together Gallinaceous and Struthious types, for they are 

 rich with an ornithic fulness of Nature ; they are so intensely generalized that they have 

 relations in many families. Yet they are a small and a decaying family, and the 

 specialized Fowls are gradually " improving " them out of existence. 



In three different places I have already treated of the Osteology of the Hemipodidse ; 

 the present addition will practically give a complete account of their Osteology, both 

 young and adult. 



The first description of their skeleton is given in my paper " On the Gallinaceous 

 Birds and Tinamous " (Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. v. plates 34, 35, pp. 172-190). In this 

 paper the osteology of two adults is given, namely, Hemipodius varius (see Owen, 

 Osteol. Catal. Boy. Coll. Surg. vol. i. p. 274, No. 1423), and of an unnamed species 

 from the Gardens of the Zoological Society. 



The next contribution is in the work " On the Shoulder-girdle and Sternum " (Ray 

 Soc. 1868, plate 16, pp. 184-186). In the figures there given and in the description 

 there is an error with regard to an additional pair of osseous centres in the young of 

 Turnix rostrata. The preparation, still in my possession, which misled me, has the 

 " lophosteon " cracked at its upper margin ; there is no " coracosteon," but merely the 



