Order GALLIFORMES. 



Family PHASIANID^ or GAME BIRDS. 



The Game Birds are a large and important group, but ill-defined 

 on what we may term the boundaries of the family. The most 

 simple way of showing their probable affinities is to place them 

 m the centre of a circle round which must be grouped in varying 

 proximity the Pigeons, the Sand Grouse, the Plovers, the Auks, 

 the Gulls, the Cuckoos, the Bustards, and the Rails. Their 

 sternum contains two notches on each side of the posterior 

 margin, which are so deeply cleft as to resemble abnormally 

 developed ribs. In the modification of their cranial bones they 

 are schizognathous ; nasals holorhinal. In their pterylosis they 

 are highly specialised ; but their myology shows affinities with 

 the Plovers, and in their digestive organs they show much affinity 

 with the Rails. 



No other known order of birds exhibit more diversity in their 

 external characters ; the great variety and brilliancy of the wattles, 

 combs, and excrescences which adorn the head, the development 

 of spur, the magnificent colours of their plumage, and the wonder- 

 ful modification of the tail feathers and coverts, are all of excep- 

 tional interest. The bill is always comparatively short and stout, 

 curved, and wide at the base. The hind toe is small and 

 elevated ; the other toes are connected at the base by a mem- 

 brane. Primaries ten in number; wings rounded; rectrices 

 variable in number. One complete moult in autumn; some 

 species have a partial moult in spring; others change their 

 feathers more or less completely several times during the year. 

 Young hatched covered with down and able to run and feed almost 

 directly they break from the shell. Begin to develop quills soon 

 after they are born, and are able to fly in the juvenile or chick 

 stage of their existence, their wing feathers being changed from 



