FAM. EURYLEMIDE 
BY ERNST HARTERT, PH. D. 
YN former times, when the ornithological system was chiefly founded on the external 
structure of the bill and feet, the Ewrylemide were mostly arranged among the 
« Picariae » or « Coraciiformes », generally near Coracias, because the bill of the 
Eurylenide has a great outward resemblance to that ot a Coracias. As long ago 

as ee on ever, attention has been drawn to the fact that the pterylography was that of 
Passerine birds, Blanchard declared that the sternum was more Passerine, Garrod and Forbes 
have studied the palate, trachea and structure of the foot and pronounced their main features as 
Passerine, Kutter called attention to the nidology and oology, which are also Passerine. It is 
therefore now universally admitted that the Ewry/emide@ are Passerine birds, though abnormal 
and best placed at the top of that order, as a distinct group. 
The sternum of the Exrylemid@, although the manubrium sterni is not forked, differs 
widely from that of Coracias and all its main features are truly Passerine; the palate is egitho- 
gnathous, the nasals holorhinal; the dorsal vertebrae are heterocoelous. The flexor longus 
hallucis leads to the hallux and sends down a tendon to the flexor perforans digitorum, which 
leads to the three front-digits. The hallux is thus incapable of independant action. The oil- 
gland is small and nude. 
The bill is very wide, flat, but higher and distinctly ridged in the Calyptomenine, the nasals 
basal, round, open, either quite exposed or overgrown with bristly feathers, or lineiform. The 
metatarsus is sometimes covered in front with some large, very distinctly separated scutelle, 
while in other forms the scutella are mostly fused, thus forming a long lamina, divided only 
on the lower end, near the toes. The back of the metatarsus is somewhat rugose, covered with 
