700 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TERRITORIES. 
among the more prominent bones of the skeleton, as the pelvis, ster- 
num, and seapular apparatus, that bind the remaining genera very 
closely together. The same may be said in a general way of the Quails, 
or Ortygine, taken as a subfamily, have 
many such characters in common, as 
compared among themselves. 
Cupidonia and Pediecetes although 
they possess the usual tetraonial oste- 
ological characters referred to above, 
have in addition quite a number of mu- 
WS tual external characters, that compel 
Y us to regard these two forms as being 
= of very near kin, and our osteological 
studies of the sub-family have certainly 
demonstrated the fact that this relation- 
ship is by no means weakened by the 
latter investigation. In short, although 
ornithologists will no doubt always retain these two forms in separate 
genera as the classification of birds goes, still it may be well to bear in 
mind that nearly or quite all of the anatomical characters of Cupidonia 
and Pediecetes when compared together bring these two Grouse nearer 
to each other than any other two forms of the group in our fauna; so 
near, in fact, that but little violence would be perpetrated by restrict- 
ing them both to one and the same genus, and no doubt there are not 
a few instances in our present classification of birds where forms not so 
nearly related as these two Grouse are that have been retained in one 
genus. 
WASHINGTON, D. C., May 1, 1882. 
Cyrtonyx massena. 
