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BUCERIDA. — CORVINA. ~ 95 
internal structure of this member been fully ascertained. 
Lastly, the feet are generally so very short, as to appear 
calculated only for perching. United to the scansorial 
birds by means of the toucans, they would seem to re- 
present the Rasores, but the structure of their feet, more 
‘imperfect than any of the familes in this order, forbids 
the supposition. _This opinion we had long entertained 
from theory, but it has recently been confirmed by a 
singular fact in their economy, communicated by an 
officer long resident in India. It seems that all the 
species of Buceros he has met with in a live .state, are 
constantly in the habit of throwing their food up in the 
air, and catching it before it is swallowed! It is im- 
‘possible to imagine a more beautiful insipient develope- 
‘ment of the fissirostral economy than is manifested by 
‘this propensity —a propensity which, divested -of its 
analogical relations, would be perfectly incomprehen- 
sible, seeing that the birds are not obliged (like swallows, 
and all the true Fissirostres) to catch their food in the 
air in the first instance. 
(109.) The Corvin, or crows, appear to be that 
Ris nearest allied to the last, although the intervening 
forms are few. The genus Frigilus, in fact, is the 
only representative we at present know of that subfamily 
which intervenes between the Buceride and the Corvine. 
The whole family, in short, has never yet been analysed ; 
so that the leading divisions alone can yet be made out 
or stated with any degree of certainty. The little value 
that can be attached to speculations on the rank of the 
“present genera, founded upon mere synthesis, will best 
appear by looking to those artificial arrangements that 
“place the short-legged rollers close to the long-legged 
and powerfully constructed grakle (Gracula religiosa), 
-— two genera, moreover, which analysis has convinced 
us do not belong to this family. Nothing, in short, is 
More easy than to divide a group like this into three, 
five, seven, or any other given number; but the divi- 
sions must always be considered as temporary, until 
confirmed by analysis. We have not yet carried our 
investigations so far as to lay before the reader an 
