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Genus CORVUS. 



Corvus, Linnaeus, Syst. Nat. i. p. 155 (1766). 



Monedula apud C. L. Brehm, Isis, 1828, p. 1274. 



Coloeus apud Kaup, Natiirl. Syst. p. 114 (1829). 



Corone apud Kaup, op. cit. p. 99 (1829). 



Frugilegus apud Lesson, fide Bonaparte, Consp. Gen. Av. i. p. 384 (1850). 



Trypanocorax apud Kaup, Journ. f. Orn. 1854, Suppl. p. lv. 



Corax apud Kaup, ut supra. 



Rhinocorax apud Sharpe, Cat. B. Brit. Mus, iii. p. 45 (1877). 



Iisr the present genus I have included several species which have been referred to separate genera 

 by several authors, but which it seems to me are better united together in one and the same 

 genus. Mr. Sharpe, in the Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum, subdivides the 

 European Crows into five genera — viz. Trypanocorax, Kaup (type Corvus frugilegus), Corvus, 

 Linnaeus (type Corvus corax), Coloeus, Kaup (type Corvus monedula), Corone, Kaup (type Corvus 

 corone), and Rhinocorax, Sharpe (type Corvus affinis), only the second of which should, it appears 

 to me, be recognized. 



The Crows have a very wide range, being universally distributed, except in New Zealand 

 and South America, eight species being found in the Western Palaearctic Region. 



In habits the Crows are wary, though at the same time, when frequenting towns and 

 villages, they are impudent and thievish. They frequent groves, woods, inhabited places, the 

 shores of the sea and rivers, and, indeed, almost any place where they can find food ; and they 

 are omnivorous, feeding on grain, fruits, insects, flesh, fish, and on offal of almost any kind. 

 They walk sedately, but with ease, fly with tolerable rapidity ; and their note varies from a harsh 

 croak or caw to a series of modulated notes which may almost be termed a song ; and when 

 domesticated they can be taught to mimic various sounds and even utter words. 



They construct nests of sticks, roots, wool, &c, which they either place on a tree or in the 

 hole of a tree, or else in the holes and crannies of ruined buildings and rocks, and deposit several 

 pale greenish-blue eggs spotted and blotched with blackish brown and olivaceous. 



Corvus corax, the type of the genus, has the beak strong, hard, stout, compressed, sharp at 

 the edges, straight at the base, curved towards the tip ; gape-line curved ; nostrils basal, covered 

 by stiff bristles directed forwards ; wings long, rather pointed, the first quill shorter than the 

 sixth, the second shorter than the fifth, the fourth longest ; tail moderate, rounded ; legs and 

 feet strong, the tarsus covered in front with four large and three inferior scutellse ; claws stout, 

 curved, acute. 



I have been unable to find where Boie uses the generic term Lycos for the Jackdaw. Giebel 

 gives the reference as Isis, 1828, p. 1273; and Sharpe gives it as Lycos, Boie, Isis, 1822, p. 55; 

 but I cannot find it referred to in either of the above places. 



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