OSTEOLOGY OF BIRDS 



171 



common fowl having so long been used as a sort of a type in the 

 study of the avian skeleton; and the general skeletal characters of 

 that form are quite similar in most of the other genera of this 

 suborder. 



In 1867, Professor Huxley grouped in his "Alectoromorphae " 

 of his suborder Schizognathae all the true gallinaceous birds, and 

 after presenting their principal characters, he says : " Excluding 

 the Pigeons and 'the Tinamidae, the group corresponds with the 

 Gallinae of authors, and contains the families Turnicidae, Phasi- 

 anidae, Pteroclidae, Megapodidae, and Cracidae. 



" The Turnicidae approach the Charadriomorphae, the Ptero- 

 clidae, the Peristeromorphae ; while the Cracidae have relations with 

 the birds of prey on the one hand, and with Palamedea and the 

 other Chenomorphae on the other." [Zool. Soc. Loud. Proc. 1867. 



p. 426,432, 433, 459] * 



A great deal of information and man}- fine figures are also to 

 be found in Kitchen Parker's memoir On the Osteology of the 

 Gallinaceous Birds and Tinanwus [Zool. Soc. Lond. Trans. 1864. 

 v. 5], and Prof. Max Fiirbringer offers the following classification 

 of this group. 



Alectorornithes. . 

 (Chameornitb.es) 



SUBORDER 



Apterygiformes 

 Crypturiformes 



Galliformes 



GROUP- FAMILY 



f Apterygidae 



Apteryges \ Dinornithidae 



Crypturi. . Crypturidae 



I Sens. str. Me- 

 gapodiidae 

 I Sens. str. Cra- 

 cidae 

 Sens7 lat. Gallidae j Sens. str. Gal- 

 | lidaes.Alec- 

 [ toropodes 

 Sens. lat. Opisthocomidae 



Sens. lat. Galli 



This author in his diagrammatic avian tree in the same work 

 {Morphologic und Systematik dcr Vogel) seems to separate the 

 galline and columbine stocks too far, and in that the present writer 

 does not agree. However, Professor Fiirbringer in the continua- 

 tion of the scheme given above places the two " suborders " Colum- 

 biformes and Psittaciformes as intermediate between the "Alec- 

 torornithes " and his " Coracornithes," an arrangement we can very 

 readily agree to, in part. 



Alfred Newton has said that " the Gallinae would seem to hold 

 a somewhat central position among existing members of the cari- 

 nate division, whence many groups diverge, and one of them, the 



1 In the paper to which reference has just been made, Professor Huxley presents us 

 with a figure of the under view of Tetrao urogallus, and two figures of the 

 skull of Crax globicera. 



