158 BULLETIN 50, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
X Furnaritine CaBanis and Heinz, Mus. Hein., ii, 1860, 22 (includes Rhodino- 
cichla!).—ScuaTER, Cat. Am. Birds, 1862, 146. 
=Furnartide StesNeceER, Stand. Nat. Hist., iv, 1885, 479, in text. 
<Synallaxvine CaBaNis and Herne, Mus. Hein., ii, 1860, 26.—SciaTER, Cat. 
Am. Birds, 1862, 149.—SunpEvaut, Met. Nat. Av. se Tent., ii, 1872, 55 
(English translation, 1889, 122). 
The Furnariide are closely related to the Dendrocolaptide and 
have usually been included in the same family, as Subfamilies Fur- 
nariine, Synallaxine, Philydorine, and Sclerurine,* three Furnariine 
genera being even referred to the ‘‘Subfamily Dendrocolaptine.? 
Prof. Garrod and Dr. Stejneger, however, have shown® that in their 
schizorhinal, instead of holorhinal, skull and dissimilar feet they 
differ sufficiently to warrant their recognition as a distinct family. 
Although distributed throughout the continental portions of the 
Neotropical Region, the Furnariide are most developed in the Pata- 
gonian and South-Brazilian Subregions, to which many of the genera, 
among them the most typical ones, are peculiar, comparatively few 
of them passing to the northward of the Isthmus of Panama, only 
25 of the more than 278 species and 10 of the 37 genera ¢ belonging 
to the Central American district. 
While some of the genera resemble Dendrocolaptine forms in 
external appearance, and presumably in habits also, the majority of 
the Furnariide are more terrestrial; some of them eminently so, and 
strongly recalling in their appearance and general habits the Larks 
(Alaudidz) and Stone-chats. Many of them inhabit reedy marshes, 
and bear a superficial likeness to the marsh-wrens (genera Telmato- 
dytes and Cistothorus), while certain small long-tailed short-billed 
forms, as Leptasthenura, recall the Parine genus Psaltriparus, others 
again resembling Creepers (Certhiide). 
Many of the species, particularly those belonging to the so-called 
Subfamily Furnariine, are remarkable for the unusual character of 
their nests, which, in some cases, consist of massive oven-like struc- 
tures built of mud or clay, in others immense heaps of twigs, whence 
the builders have received the name of ‘‘fagot-gatherers” from the 
human inhabitants of the country. 
What has been said concerning the unsatisfactory classification of 
the Formicariide * and my efforts to devise a better one applies as 
well to the present group. 
@ See Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum, vol. xv., pp. xi-xiii, 2-126. 
(By Philip Lutley Sclater.) 
b Genera Margarornis, Premnoplex, and Pygarrhicus. 
¢ See Garrod, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1877, pp. 449-452, and Stejneger, Standard 
Natural History, vol. iv, Birds, 1885, pp. 478, 481. 
@ As enumerated in Sharpe’s Hand-list of the Genera and Species of Birds, vol. iii, 
1901, pp. 45-74, under Dendrocolaptide. 
€ See p. 9. 
