474 BULLETIN 50, CTNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



mesorhinium elevated and arched; maxillary tomium with or (usually) 

 without subterminal notch. Nostril variable; usually longitudinal, 

 in lower or lower anterior portion of nasal fossa and overhung by an 

 operculum; sometimes roundish or broadly oval, in anterior end of 

 nasal fossa and nonoperculate; occasionally surrounded by membrane 

 and very rarely** very small, circular, and rimmed, in center of nasal 

 fossa. Kictal bristles usually obsolete, but frequently obvious, with 

 one or two fairly well developed; latero-frontal feathers erect-declinate 

 (never antrorse), without bristly tip. Wing rather short to very 

 short, usually much concave beneath, much rounded; tenth (outer- 

 most), primary well developed, at least half as long as ninth, always 

 broad; ninth never longer than third, often shorter than first, some- 

 times much shorter than secondaries; seventh to fourth (usually sev- 

 enth, sixth, and fifth) longest. Tail extremely variable as to relative 

 length, sometimes shorter than tarsus, sometimes slightly longer than 

 wing, usually from about half to two-thirds as long as wing; always 

 more or less rounded, sometimes graduated for more than one-third 

 its length; rectrices soft and rounded at tip.* Tarsus long (usually 

 longer than exposed culmen, never very much shorter), the acrotar- 

 sium always scutellate, the planta tarsi sometimes also more or less 

 divided into segments, and the heel joint more or less distinctly scu- 

 tellate behind; middle toe, with claw, always shorter than tarsus 

 (sometimes very nearly as long); lateral toes usually of equal or very 

 nearly equal length (when different the outer longer than the inner '^), 

 rarely conspicuously unequal, both usually reaching (without claws) 

 to somewhat beyond middle (penultimate) joint of middle toe'* but 

 never beyond middle of subterminal phalanx of the latter; basal pha- 

 lanx of middle toe united for most (sometimes practically the whole) of 

 its length to outer toe and for at least half its length to inner toe.^ 



Coloration. — Brown or rufescent hues predominating, usually varied 

 by bars of dusky, sometimes streaked, speckled, or squamated; under 

 parts white, gray, buffy, tawny, rufous, or sooty, or with two or 

 more of these colors combined, rarely immaculate, usually more or 

 less barred or streaked; the plumage never with red, yellow, green, 

 nor blue, or other pure colors. Sexes alike, and young usually not 

 materially, if at all, different in coloration from adults. 



« In the genus Leucolepis only. 



6 Except, possibly, in Hylorchilus, of whicli I have not been able to examine a 

 specimen with perfect tail, one lacking the rectrices altogether, while the other has 

 but few of them and these much worn, those which remain being apparently acumi- 

 nate, with the rather stiff but slender shaft slightly projecting. 



« Except in genera Tdmatodytes and Oistothorus. 



<^Xn one genus, Salpinctes, the inner toe (without claw) falls short of this joint, 

 while in two others, Catherpes and Hylorchilus, it reaches to but not beyond the joint. 



« In two genera, Telmatodytes and Oistothorus, the inner toe is united externally at 

 base to the hallux. 



