804 PROFESSOR W. K. PAEKEE ON THE 



for the setting-on of those small blunt hooks, the ethmo-palatines (e.pa). In front 

 the vomer gradually, by steps as it were, being somewhat notched, narrows in ; and 

 the actual fore end may be rounded (fig. 2, v) or slightly emarginate (fig. 3, v). On 

 each side of the fore end there is an oblique shoulder, thickened like the keel and 

 the margins ; to this shoulder is fastened the intumed alinasal lamina (^. al), the extre- 

 mity of the alinasal floor (n.f) ; it is attached like a splint to the under surface of the 

 cartilage, but is not grafted upon it. 



Here the broad double vomer lies, at its fore end, like a floor beneath the contiguous 

 part of the nasal labyrinth. The least overgrowth of this bone would have produced 

 that remarkable character which is seen in the Passerines. The process is arrested; 

 but the elements are in immediate contact. 



Thmocorus, however, fails in one point, viz. that it has no additional " septo-maxil 

 laries " at this part, which are seen in the Tumicidae and commonly in the Passerinae ; 

 but in the higher forms of that topmost group they are frequently suppressed. The 

 vomerine cartilages, or labials, are not seen in the adult ; they may have existed in an 

 early stage. The nasal labyrinth approaches that of the Turnicidfe ; the parts are 

 totally unossified (walls, coils, and septum). The inferior turbinal (fig. 4, i. tb) is coiled 

 once and a half ; it is thus inferior to that of the Gallinacese and of Carinate birds gene- 

 rally, but comes nearer to the state of those parts in the Turnicidse. As in those birds, 

 there is a nasal floor of cartilage ; but here it is continuous, and not a long severed 

 band. The praemaxillary mass (fig. 5, px) is very unlike what obtains in the birds that 

 come nearest to this ; it is short, high, triangular, and very strong, quite vmlike that of 

 a Plover, a Crane, or a Rail, stronger and higher than in the GallinacesB, and wholly 

 unlike their bony beak in the intense ankylosis by which maxillaries, prsemaxillaries, 

 and palatines are all welded together into one strong mass, the seams of which are all 

 lost. Indeed the beak in this bird is intermediate between that of the conii'ostral 

 Finch and the atrvirostral Fowl. Here I will enumerate the points of harmony between 

 this almost undeclared type and the Coracomorpbse : — 



1. It is jEgithognathous {imperfectly). 



2. The bill is nearly conirostral. 



3. The basipterygoids are more thoroughly suppressed than in any birds except 



the Coracomorphse. 



4. The lacrymal is abortively developed ; it is very small. 



5. The ecto-ethmoidal wall projects beyond the frontal roof, is flush with the rest 



of the face, and is highly ossified (fig. 5, eth,p.p). 



6. The space between the forks of the nasal, instead of being a clear slit as in the 



