86 
NATURAL HISTORY OF 
percliing and grasping, and through which, from 
their habits and foiTO, the necessary connexion with 
tlie Insessorial Order is supported, are likely to con- 
stitute one ; the True Pigeons, of which our ring- 
pigeon and common pigeon may be considered typi- 
cal, a second ; the Turtles, and their allies, with feet 
of different proportions from the preceding, and gra- 
duated tails, a third ; the Ground Pigeons, or Co- 
lumbi-gallines of the French naturalists, a fourth ; 
and the fifth is not unlikely to be represented by 
Vieillot’s genus Lophyrus, in which the deviation 
from the proper Columbine form is not to that of 
the typical Rasores, but to the Cracida, placed at 
the farther extremity, and, like the Columbidae, an- 
other aberrant family of the Rasorial Order. 
The Columbidae possess a very extensive geogra- 
phical distribution, species being found in every 
quarter of the world, and in all its chmates, except 
those within the frigid zones. It is, however, in 
the tropical climates of Southern Asia, and the is- 
lands of the great Indian Archipelago, that the spe- 
cies swarm in the greatest variety and abundance ; 
for in these w^arm and genial climates, a never-fail- 
ing supply of food, adapted to each kind, is al- 
ways to be found. It is here that most of the 
thick-billed pigeons, * vying with the parrots in the 
colour of their plumage, and, in some respects, re- 
sembling them in their manners, luxuriate amidst 
the thick and umbrageous foliage of the banyan, and 
other trees, whose fruit affords them a rich and ne- 
• Vinago, Cuv. 
