3U8 PROFESSOR W. K. PARKER OX THE 



in having a septo-maxillary on each side above the edge of the bone at its middle 

 (fig. 9, s.mx) '. 



The forks of the Sun-Bittern's vomer are large and divergent ; they combine in front 

 to form a rounded keel, M'hich dies out where the bone suddenly narrows ; it broadens 

 in a lanceolate manner again, and then ends in a long bony needle in front. The 

 whole fore beak is quite like that of Anthropoides, and very much unlike the very 

 bony and solid beak of a Pelargomorph, even of the frailest kinds, viz. Botaurus viri- 

 dis, Ardea garzetta. Indeed the wall between the Charadriomorphse and the Gerano- 

 morphae is very thin ; and if the latter are not special, yet they are general Pluvialines 

 (see Huxley " on the Classification of Birds," Proc. Zool. Soc. 1867, p. 457). 



The palatines, like those of the Kagu (Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. vi. pi. xcii. fig. 2), are 

 truly Ardeine ; in the Stilt-Plover {Himantopus) the transpalatine angle is considerably 

 produced ; but it is in the true Ai-deines, and in Eurypyga and the Kagu, that this is 

 most intense. Here the trans- and ^osfpalatines end opposite each other ; in Passerines 

 the external process is a good distance in front of the postpalatine end. 



Another point of structure is seen in this type : there is a "palatal fenestra " {pa. /). 

 It is a membranous space tending to divide the proper palatine bar from the " os trans- 

 versum," or transpalatine, which it does imperfectly. This structure has its highest 

 development in the Tiger Bittern, Tlgrisoma leucolophum, a very Mycterian Bittern. But 

 this structure also occurs down lelow in a simple Pluvialine, namely the Whimbrel 

 {Kumenius phceopus). 



The interpalatine ridges, the external sharp edge, and the intermediate deep muscular 

 space are well shown here, as in the Kagu and the Ardeines; the prsepalatine bar 

 (pr.pa) is very long and slender. 



Above, where the slender maxillary is giving off its elegant crested maxiUo-palatines, 

 there is an ear-shaped process looking inwards from the bone, as in Rhinochetus and 

 Psophia, which process I took erroneously for a "septo-maxillary" snag. The maxillo- 

 palatines show but little mesiad of the palatine bars : but above they are each deve- 

 loped into a most elegant flask-shaped air-pouch, which opens in front. 



The sutures of the jugal bar (fig. 7) are nearly filled in ; the base of the nasal crus 

 and the angle of the prsemaxillary both grow backwards as needle-like styles. 



The upper part of the head is Ardeine. In Anthropoides and the Eails the super- 

 orbital edge is bevelled for the nasal gland ; in Eurypyga, as in the Kagu and Heron, 

 not at all, the edges of the orbit being well produced upwards and outwards, especially 

 in the huge-eyed Kagu. 



The septum nasi is ossified, and has a large fenestra in front ; it is, however, Ardeine, 



' In my paper on the Kagu (Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. vi. p. 502) I have spoken of the septo-maxillary as a 

 region of the maxillary, a mere process : this is a mistake. For many years I searched in vain for any distinct 

 rudiment of those reptilian bones ; but although they are absent in many birds, they are common amongst the 

 Passerines, as I have lately shown, and turn up in other groups. 



