CHLOROPSIS. 



The type of the genus we now propose, though a bird known in our col- 

 lections for many years, does not appear to have had its affinities properly in- 

 vestigated, or rightly understood. By Gmelin and Latham it was included 

 under the title of Turdus cochinsinensis, in their widely extended genus 

 Turdus, which embraced a great variety of forms, many of them possessing 

 scarcely a feature of the true typical species of the genus, and among them 

 the bird above mentioned. Dr Shaw, in the 8th volume of his General Zoo- 

 logy, classes it in Certhia, — a genus, as instituted by Linn^us, containing not 

 only birds differing from each other in habits and manners, but in the de- 

 velopment of their proportions and anatomical structure. To some of the 

 groups, however, included under that generic term, and which are now cha- 

 racterised as the families of the Cinanyridce and Nectariniada, it appears to 

 have considerable affinity. Mr Stephens, the continuator of the same work, 

 proposes * to place it in Brachypus, a genus lately formed by Mr Swainson 

 for that group of the smaller Merulidce distinguished by the shortness of their 

 tarsi and toes, and the comparative weakness of their bill, and which have 

 also been separated from the other Thrushes by MM. Temminck, under the 

 name of Turdoides. But with this group it seems to have no intimate affi- 

 nity, the resemblance being confined to the proportion of the feet. Cuvier, 

 in his Regne Animal, classes it with the Philedons (genus Melliphaga of 

 Lewin), a family becoming every day more extended, by the discovery of 

 new species, and exhibiting a great variety of forms, but all united in affi- 

 nity with each other by the common nature of their food, and the conforma- 

 tion of their tongue. In the views of this distinguished naturalist as to the 

 appropriate station of this group, we fully concur, and have accordingly made 

 our genus a constituent part of the family of the Melliphagida; of Vigors. 

 The species at present known, and strictly referable to the genus, are few, 

 and are all natives of the warm climates of Asia. From the formation of 

 their tongue, which is long, extensile, and furnished at the tip with a pencil 

 of cartilaginous fibres, they are supposed to feed principally upon the nectar 

 of flowers ; or, what is still more probable (judging from the strength of their 

 bill, as compared with that of the true nectariferous species), on the juices 

 or flesh of the tropical fruits. 



* See 13th vol. of Shaw's General Zoology. 



