514 CLASS AVES. 



the great oenus Turdus into three sections, tlie first of 

 which is devoted to the thrushes proper, the second to the 

 blackbirds, and the third to the mockers. M. Temminck, 

 in the first edition of his ' Manual of Ornithology,' divided 

 the birds of the same genus into three sections, according 

 to their manners and habits, under the denomination of 

 Sylvains, Saxicoles, and Riverains, (woodland, rock, and 

 river-haunting birds.) Those of the first section, nestle and 

 live in woods, bushes, parks, gardens, emigrating in troops, 

 and subsisting almost entirely on berries, except at the epoch 

 when they are bringing up their young, in which their prin- 

 cipal aliment consists of insects. Those of the second section 

 inhabit precipitous cliffs, and the rocky portions of the high- 

 est mountains, in the clefts of which they live in solitude, and 

 have thus some relations with Saxicola, but differ from that 

 sub-genus in the colour of the caudal quills, the majority of 

 Avhich are red, and the two intermediate ones black, while the 

 tail of the true saxicola, most generally exhibits large masses 

 of white. Those of the third section do not quit humid 

 places, and live among reeds, and their nourishment principally 

 consists of flies and aquatic insects. This last section compre- 

 hended the Turdus Arundinaceus of Linnaeus; but MM. 

 Meyer and Cuvier, considering that these river-birds exhibited 

 more relations with the numerous species of sylvia which 

 inhabit the water side, have united the last-mentioned species 

 to sylvia; and M. Temminck, in imitation of them, has sup- 

 pressed his third section. 



Turdus and Sylvia present in their general attributes so 

 much analogy that it is scarcely possible to trace between them 

 a line of distinction. We accordingly find that many natu- 

 ralists range with turdvis species which others class with the 

 sylvia and motacilla of Linnaeus. The turdus coronatus of La.- 

 tham is, for instance, a motacilla with Gmehn, and the turdus 

 triochos of Gmelin is a sylvia with Latham. The passage of 

 one genus to another is so nearly imperceptible, that it is next 



