252 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



This order VIII of Stejneger's scheme is preceded by the Grallae 

 (order VII), and followed by the Herodii (order IX), which last 

 contains the ibises and the stork-heron families. 



Passing to Prof. Max Fiirbringer's arrangement, we find the 

 Anseriformes, Podicipitiformes, and the Ciconiiformes as suborders 

 arrayed under his order Pelargornithes in which the Palamedeae 

 are not even included, but stand as an " intermediate suborder," be- 

 tween the Pelargornithes and the struthious forms, while within 

 the former the flamingoes are separated from the Anseres by the 

 Diver grebe groups, both living and extinct. 



So far as I have been enabled to follow Mr Seebohm on the clas- 

 sification of birds, in the various schemes he has at different times 

 proposed, the following seems to be his view upon the position in 

 the system of the Anseres, viz : 



SUBCLASS ORDER SUBORDER 



, f \ 23 Palamedeae 



. p „n:f „„-,„«, j Lamellirostres - 24 Anseres 



4 Galhiormes j . , 2 _ Phoenicopteri 



[ Gallo- Grallae 25-32 



The fact of making the attempt to establish five or six " sub- 

 classes " in such a group of vertebrates as existing birds is enough, 

 in my estimation, to cast suspicion, at least, upon the scheme pro- 

 posed by Mr Seebohm, while in the arrangement of his " suborders " 

 it has not a little to recommend it. 



Dr Sharpe in 1891 in his classification of birds placed the Flam- 

 ingoes in one order and the " Pelecaniformes " in another, while be- 

 tween the two he inserts the Anseres in the following way : 



Order XII Anseriformes (Cosmopolitan) 

 Suborder XLIV Anseres 

 Family 1 Cnemiornithidae 



2 Anseranatidae 



3 Plectropteridae 



4 AnatiJae 

 Subfamily Anserinae 



Cygninae 

 Anatinae 

 Merginae 

 Suborder XLV Palamedeae (Neotropical) 

 Family Anhimidae 



Some of the statements advanced by Dr Sharpe in reference to 

 tne osteologic characters upon which this classification rests are 

 not correct. He is not responsible for these, however, but has 

 largely relied upon others for his information on such matters. For 



