1839.] On a new Genus of the Fissirostral Tribe. 35 



Art. IV. — On a new Genus of the Fissirostral Tribe. By B. H. 

 Hodgson, Esq. Catamandu. 



[Note by the Editors. — This and the following paper were transmitted to the late 

 Editor more than two and a half years back, and were acknowledged at the time, 

 though by some accident afterwards mislaid. The expert ornithologist will perceive 

 that Mr. H's. genus Ray a is equivalent to the Psarisoma of Swainson, and the 

 Crossodera of Gould ; but, by referring to dates, it will be seen that Mr. H. was the 

 first person to characterise this new form, of which he has given two species.] 



Dentirostres todidce, Swainson. — Fissirostres todidce, Vigors.— 

 Syndactyles, Cuvier. 



Genus — new, Rdya nobis. Species two, new, Sericeogula and 

 Hubropygia. Rai and Rai Suga of the Nipalese. Habitat, Central 

 and lower regions. 



These singular birds might be considered with almost equal pro- 

 priety as the Dentirostral type of the Fissirostres, or the Fissirostral 

 type of the Dentirostres. 



Swainson would regard them in the latter light; Vigors in the 

 former; Cuvier would probably have placed them with hesitation 

 among his Syndactyly. They seem to me to be compounded of Ti- 

 tyra and Eurylaimus — two parts of the latter, and one of the former. 



The bill is shorter, broader, more arched along the culmen, less 

 suddenly hooked, as well as more deeply cleft in the head than in 

 Tityra ; it is longer, and more covered by those frontal plumes 

 which entirely conceal the nares, than in Eurylaimus. The nos- 

 trils have exactly the same character as in Tityra, but they are 

 considerably more advanced, being nearer to the tip than to the gape. 

 The wings agree in their gradation with those of Tityra, but they 

 are shorter and feebler than in that genus, or in Eurylaimus ; and 

 in, consonance probably with this feebler structure of the wing is the 

 elongation and extreme gradation of the tail of our birds, a feature 

 in which they differ alike from Tityra and from Eurylaimus. 



The feet of the Rayae, like their bills, more nearly resemble those 

 of Eurylaimus than those of Tityra ; and whilst they differ from 

 both genera by the smoothness of the acrotarsia, they depart from 

 their otherwise strict correspondences with the feet of the former 

 genus by the essential circumstance of a more restricted junction 

 between the toes. In Eurylaimus the exterior toe is united to the 

 end of the second phalanx, the interior, to the end of the first. This, 

 the typical syndactyle structure, is only half developed in Rdya; 

 the connexion between whose lateral fore toes reaches forward only 

 to the middle of the respective joints. 



