PYRRHULlNiB, OR BULFINCHES. 125 
by their bright yellow or orange 
throat, and have received the 
generic name of Mavroiiyai 
{M. CajmuiSiflg. 170.). From 
the enormous length of their 
hind claws, («) they obviously 
represent SturncUa in the circle 
of and, 
if the two groups are compared, 
they will be found in parallel 
situations. The genus Certhi- 
Uiuda differs from ail the foregoing by the length, slender- 
ness, and curvature of its bill: this leads us to suppose it 
is tlie tenuirostral type, for it is certainly more removed 
from the typical larks {Calendula) than any form yet 
discovered. Myrafru and Brachonyx, according to our 
analysis, appear to be aberrant species between Calen- 
dula and Jprodro»na,and are therefore not primary forms. 
Hitherto no example of this subfamily has been found 
in Tropical America, although one or two species, com- 
mon in the Northern States, seem to come into the fissi- 
rostral genus Alauda. 
(138.) The PyuRHUi-iNiE, or bulflnches, is the last 
division of this family. Their very short bill, the 
breadth of which, unlike nearly all the other finches, is 
often greater than its thickness, together with the large 
size of its head, and the shortness of the feet, seem to 
point it out as the fissirostral division. In addition to 
these characters, nearly the whole of the genera have the 
commissure of the bill very much curved, and the upper 
mandible, or rather the culmen, arched from its base. The 
first genus we enter upon after quitting the larks, is 
Pyrrhulauda,a.\ittlii group of birds peculiar to the tropical 
regions of Africa and India, exhibiting the feet of a lark 
with the bill of a Pyrrhula : to this genus we originally 
gave the name of Megnlntu *, on account of the great 
size of the ears, or rather of the space over which the 
ear-feathers spread ; but as that name has been already 
given to a division of the genus Cards among quadrupeds, 
* Zool. Journal, lit. 
170 
