MUSCICAPA. 
217 
ters), by the very small size of the first quill- 
feather. The strongest of these resemblances, how- 
ever, is between Muscicapa and Samcola , for here 
the spurious quill-feather and the whole structure 
of the wings is almost precisely the same. Neither 
■will the bill altogether “ serve our turn for 
although that of Muscicapa is rather more de- 
pressed, such a distinction, founded merely upon a 
comparative quality, is vague and unsatisfactory. 
Nevertheless, as one family lives chiefly upon the 
ground, and the other is never seen but upon trees, 
this difference of habit necessarily carries with it 
a difference of structure, and this is immediately 
apparent in the feet, — those of Saxicola being 
nearly half as large again as those of Muscicapa. 
The one, in fact, is constructed for perching only, 
the latter for perching and walking ; hence the 
great length of the tarsus, and the complete sepa- 
ration of the toes in all the different genera of the 
Saxicolirue* , — a structure quite opposed to the 
shortness of the tarsus, and the union of the outer 
and inner toe, which pervades, more or less, through 
the whole of the Muscicapince. 
The variations in the foregoing characters of 
Muscicapa , so far as they have come before us, 
will now be stated. Let us first, however, call the 
attention of the ornithologist to the last bird which 
has been mentioned in our account of Myiagra , 
because its structure will assist us materially in 
* One of these is composed of tlie robins, EryOtaca, which 
Muscicapa , as now restricted, represents. 
