1842.] Asiatic Society. 467 



Dendrocygna major, Jerdon. 



Tadorna Bellonii v. vulpanser, Auct : the European Shieldrake, of which this is 

 the second specimen I have met with in the bazaar ; and lastly, I shall only further 

 mention 



Glareola torquata ; the Collared Pratincole : a specimen of which I had the good 

 fortune to procure alive, leading me at a glance to perceive its true affinities, which 

 heretofore had constantly puzzled me, in common, I believe, with every student of 

 Zoology who has bestowed attention on the classification of Birds. Linnaeus arranged 

 this bird as Hirundo pratincola ; and Baron Cuvier included its genus among his 

 Echassiers or " Stilt birds;" viz. the Grallatores, or "Waders" of modern English 

 systematists, remarking — " Nous terminerons ce tableau des echassiers par trois genres 

 qu'il est difficile d'associer a. d'autres, et que Ton peut considerer comme formant 

 separement de petites families." The three genera adverted to are Chionis, Glareola, 

 and Phcenicopterus ; which are associated also by M. Temminck in his heterogeneous 

 assemblage of odds and ends, styled by him Alectorides. Now, of these three genera, 

 the first, or that of the Sheathbill (Chionis), has been satisfactorily referred by M. 

 Blainville, on anatomical data, to the immediate proximity of Hcematopus, an associa- 

 tion of which the propriety is readily seen when once suggested*, and on similar data 

 I have long been satisfied that the Flamingoes (Phcenicopterus) should be ranged 

 among the Lamellirostres or Anatidoe, a position which has also been assigned to them 

 by Mr. Swainson: this latter author, in common with most of the recent British 

 writers on Ornithology, has referred the Pratincoles to the Charadriadce, or 

 Plover family, associating them more immediately with Cursor ius; but Mr. 

 Jenyns (in his British Vertebrata), really as if selecting the most outre posi- 

 tion he could find, has included this genus in his Rallidcefl There, too, Mr. 

 Yarrell (in his 'British Birds') has followed him in grouping it; but this natural- 

 ist was so fortunate as to obtain an egg of our present species, which he has figur- 

 ed, and remarks that "the Pratincole has been arranged by some authors with the 

 Swallows, by others near the Rails : but I believe, with Mr. Selby, that it ought to be 

 included in the family of the Plovers ; and had I known its Plover-like habits and 

 eggs sooner, I should have arranged it between Cursorius and Charadrius." The fi- 

 gure of the egg which he has given, however, appears to me to accord still better with 

 my view of the affinities of this genus. Several years ago, Mr. Gould called my at- 

 tention to the fact that the Collared Pratincole had a slightly pectinated middle claw, 

 and suggested to me whether, after all, the great Swedish naturalist was not right, at 

 least in bringing this bird among the Insessores Fissirostres of Vigors ; but at that 

 time I inclined to hold a different opinion, and so far as the structure in question is 

 . concerned, that alone could scarcely influence the systematic position of the genus, as 

 it occurs in widely separated families J ; and as I have further always held the opinion 



* Allied to Chionis are the remarkable genera Attagis, d'Orbigny, and Tinochorus, Vieillot, from 

 the South American Cordilleras, and the anatomy of these equally refers them to the same system- 

 atic station. Vide Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle under Captain Fitzroy. 



t I need not ask what character it has in common with the Rails, but rather what it has not in 

 direct and obvious opposition to them ? 



% E. g., in many Caprimulgidce, Ardcadce, and Pelicanidce ; its intent being apparently to cleanse 

 the rictus from such fish scales, &c. as may adhere thereto, or, in the instance of the Caprimulgidce, 

 to detach the legs of beetles which may ditch, and thus impede the bird's swallowing them. 



3 Q 



