COULTIR SHAPED BILLS. 219 



the first of which are fishers, and the others rather 

 miscellaneous in their feeding", have it straight, or 

 nearly so ; while that of the spoonbills, as may be 

 seen by the preceding figure, has very little of the 

 knife-shape, from which the group is named. 



The cranes, storks, and several other genera, all of 

 which act the part of scavengers, and most of them 

 are migrant, have the most typical bills. Among- 

 these are the adjutant of India, and the boatbill of 

 tropical America. The latter bill is a very singular 

 one. It resembles two boats applied the one to the 

 other, and while the greater length of the tomia is 

 trenchant, as in the storks, the tip of the upper man- 

 dible is hooked, with a tooth on each side, and that 

 of the lower is pointed. It is understood to feed 

 indiscriminately on fresh water Crustacea, on reptiles, 

 and on fishes. 



There are, however, so many forms of bills among 

 the birds of this very curious division, that no one 

 can be selected as typical of the others, and the whole 

 are by much too numerous to have a place in this 

 short sketch. These diversities in the form of the 

 bill show that, how much soever the birds which axe 

 arranged in this division may resemble each other in 

 their haunts, the nature of their food, or their habits, 

 the bill is not the part of their organisation after 

 which they should be classed, though, in proportion 

 as this part of their structure is less fitted for being 

 the character of the group, it is better for distinguish- 

 ing the genera. 



BILLS OF THE LONGIHOSTRES. 



The bills of this group, like those of the pre- 

 ceding one, do not admit of an exact average 

 definition, farther than that they are all of con- 



