HONEY-EATEti. 155 



then knew under the name of Anthophagus, and recent observations 

 have fully established his opinion. 



M. Audebert also, in his Oiseaux Dores, has noticed many of 

 them among the Creepers, under the appellation of Heorotaire, a 

 title adopted by him from the natives of Atooi, who give that name 

 to the Red Hooked-billed Species.* Many others, yet classed under 

 the Genus of Creepers, &c. must still remain in uncertainty in this 

 particular, some of which, no doubt, when better known, may 

 hereafter find a place in this Genus. 



Under this predicament must at present stand a few belonging to 

 the Old Continent, or of African origin — as the Ceylonese, Loten's, 

 Yellow-winged, and Long-billed Creepers, in which the tongue is 

 elongated, and which occasionally extract honey from flowers ; but 

 in these the bill appears to be that appropriated to the Creeper 

 Genus of former authors, and there placed accordingly, on which 

 account we do not feel inclined to alter their situation. 



As the birds which form this Genus differ greatly in the shape of 

 the bill, although otherwise conformable in the tongue, we have 

 thought right to make two divisons of them ; the one containing 

 such as have the bill more stout, approaching to that of the Thrush ; 

 the other with more slender bills, as in the Creepers, and some of 

 them curved in a very considerable degree. 



* Mr. Lenin has also, in his publication of the birds of New-Holland, distinguished the 

 few he has described, by the name of Honey-Sucker. 



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