I 86 GALLIFORMES : MESITIDAE 



The remaining genera are Xotliocercus with five, Taoniscus with 

 one, and Tinamotis with two species. 



Order IX. GALLIFORMES. 



The Galliformes, or Gallinaceous Birds, constitute a large 

 and fairly homogeneous Order, situated between the Tinami- 

 formes and the G-ruiformes, if we assume the former to be classi- 

 fied in accordance with the views of Dr. Gadow, and not to be 

 placed nearer to the Eatitae ; the Gruiformes again linking 

 themselves to the Laro-Limicoline section of the Charadriiformes, 

 and so forth. Opisthocomiis, however, though decidedly Galline, 

 shows considerable resemblance to the Cuckoo-tribe.^ The present 

 Order may be divided into the Sub-Orders Mesitae, with the 

 Pamily Jfesitidae ; Turnices, with the Tumicidae or Button- 

 (,)uails, and the Fed i onomidae ; Galli, with the Mega-podiidae or 

 Mound-builders, the Cracidae or Curassows, and the Phasianidae 

 or Game-birds, Fowls, and the like ; and finally Opisthocomi, with 

 the Family Opist]iiwvmidii.c, containing but one species, the excep- 

 tionally curious Hoatzin. Among the GriHi, the Megapodiidae 

 and Cracidae together compose Professor Huxley's group of Peris- 

 teropodes or Pigeon-footed forms, where all the toes are in one plane; 

 the Phasianidae standing alone in his Alectoropodes, or Fowl- 

 footed division, where the hallux is elevated above its fellows. 



Excluding Mesites, of which comparatively little is known, all 

 the members of the Order agree in having a more or less globular 

 crop, and a somewhat scanty supply of down in the adults, with 

 a more uniform coating in the young, which becomes thinner in 

 OpistJiocomus ; they may be distinguished from the Gruiformes, 

 except Rhinochef.us, by their impervious nostrils, while the 

 Tinamiformes differ in the compound structure of their bills, the 

 primitive sternum, and the invariably weak rectrices. 



Sub-Order Mesitae. Fam. I. Mesitidae. — This consists of 

 a single genus, Mesites, from Madagascar, originally referred by 

 Isidore Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire to the neighbourhood of the Pigeons, 

 and by subsequent writers to that of the Passerine, Ardeine, or 

 Ealline birds.^ W. A. Forbes * classed it next to E'urypyga and 



' H. Gadow, Bronn's TMer-Reich, Aves, Syst. Theil, 1893, p. 176. 



2 A. Milne-Edwards, Ann. Sci. Nat. (6) Zool. vii. 1878, Art. 6. 



2 P.Z.S. 1882, pp. 267-271. 



