FISSIROSTRES. 
383 
one of which crosses the quills at about an inch 
from the point. The tail also is black, with an 
angular band of white across the centre, and a 
narrow edging of the same colour on the outer 
feather. The female differs in having the plu- 
mage less marked, and the crest not so fully 
developed. 
FISSIROSTRES. 
Those members of the fifth great tribe, the 
Fissirostres, which we can claim as natives or 
visiters to our islands, will complete our review 
of the British Incessores, which, in our anxiety 
to give as complete as possible, has already 
exceeded our usual limits, and obliged us to con- 
dense the notices of some of those which come 
more seldom to our shores. The forms which 
occur in Britain among the Fissirostres are, as 
in the two last tribes, also extremely limited. 
The great mass of known species are entirely 
insectivorous ; countries of particular temperature 
and characters are necessary for the production 
of insects, and the climate of Northern Europe 
being unfavourable for their extensive develop- 
ment, the birds which compose the tribe are 
comparatively deficient within its range. In two 
of the families we have a single example, and in 
another only two. In the first, Merops may be 
thus characterized : 
