2 
BEAUTIFUL BIRDS. 
handsome forms, hut their voice is harsh and dis- 
agreeable. They, inhabit the depths of forests, and 
arc not, therefore, often observed. Their general con- 
formation would induce the idea that they feed upon 
the wing, and not upon the ground, as has hitherto 
been supposed. Their generic characters are : Bill 
of mean length, higher than broad, compressed, 
straight ; the upper mandible bent at the point ; gape 
wide ; nostrils basal and lateral, half-covered by a mem- 
brane, whicli is furnished with stiff, bristly feathers ; 
wings long, acuminated, having the first quill shorter 
than the second, which is the longest in the wing; tarsus 
shorter than the middle toe ; tail generally long, capable 
of spreading, and composed of firm feathers ; feet short ; 
all the toes free to their bases ; inner toe the shortest. 
A few accidental stragglers of one of the 'species, 
Coi'acias garrula (the Grarrulous or European Boiler), 
have at different times been taken in Great Britain. 
In Germany this species appears to be common ; and 
it is also numerous in many parts of Sweden and 
Benin ark. It is a bird of restless and fierce disposi. 
tion, and very clamorous. 
Mr. Swainson, in the second volume of his ‘‘ Birds 
of Western Africa,” referring to the Blue-bodied Boi- 
ler (Qoracias cyanogaster) , says, if richness of colour- 
ing alone constituted beauty, this Bollei’ would be 
the most splendid of all the birds of Western Africa* 
No effort of art can possibly do justice to those in- 
imitable rich lines of ultramarine, herjl colour, and 
changeable fawn, with which it is ornamented ; for 
there are no tints hitherto discovered, either mineral 
or vegetable, which will enable the painter to produce 
