Order Limicol^ 53 



ORDER LI M ICOL/E. 



IT is very undesirable to repel the would-be student, or tangle his faculties, 

 ■with the dry bones of the innumerable systems under which birds have been 

 classified. It will be sufficient for me to mention that the Limicolce form a tolerably 

 well-defined group, with a relationship on the Stone-Curlew side to the Bustards, 

 through the Plovers to the Jacamars, and more distantly to the Pigeons and 

 Sand- Grouse. 



Amongst their characteristics may be mentioned that their eggs are very large 

 in proportion to the size of the parent ; incubation lasts a comparatively long 

 time, i.e., about three weeks. From these two peculiarities it follows that the 

 young, which are born covered with thick down, are hatched with their eyes open, 

 and can run about within a very few hours of leaving the shell. Moreover, they 

 are born with a portion of the egg-yolk unused, and enclosed in the body cavity, 

 so that they only need to supplement this reserve of nourishment as they learn 

 to feed. The Limicolce have large eyes, which stamps them as chiefly nocturnal 

 feeders. 



Their principal anatomical peculiarities may be briefly mentioned ; they 

 fall into Huxley's class Schizognathce, (Split-palate), which means that the 

 palatine bone of the roof of the mouth, and its maxillo-palatine process, are not 

 united to the vomer, as they are in the birds of prey and many other orders 

 Secondly, the Septum nasi, or bony partition between the right and left nasal 

 cavity, is incomplete, so that there is communication between the two. Thirdly, 

 two extreme types of bill are found in the Limicolce; there is the hard 

 insensible bill, a capable weapon, like the Oyster-Catcher's ; and there is the soft, 

 flexible, sensitive bill, as in the Snipe and other probers. Lastly, the spinal 

 feather tract is forked on the shoulders, (except in CEdicnenms), and shews a gap 

 in the middle of the back. For a fuller explanation of these it is recommended 



