136 ON THE CLASSIFICATION OP BIRDS. 
principal group of the woodpecker family, we are conducted 
by the minute woodpecker (^Asthenunis minutiis Sw.), 
whose black and spotted head indicates an affinity to 
Malacolophus. M. Temminck, having discovered a small 
barbut wliich is closely related to this type, has thought 
it expedient, without any assigned reason, to reject our 
name, and substitute a new one of his own. The 
barbuts have the same constructed feet, and possess the 
same property of climbing, as the woodpeckers, but in a 
much less degree : their tail feathers are soft, and of the 
ordinary construction : the bill, in some, is very strong, 
straight, and compressed ; in others it is greatly depressed ; 
and in one group, short and toothed. Mr. BurcheU was 
the first naturalist who discovered the affinity of these 
singular birds to the woodpeckers ; having repeatedly 
heard their loud tapping in the forests of Southern Africa, 
and witnessed their dexterity in climbing trees : in the 
straight-billed or typical barbuts (JBucco), we have the 
predominant colours of the parrots — green, red, blue, and 
yellow variously combined ; while the black and red 
plumage of the tooth-billed division (which is the true 
type of the whole) corresponds with that of the most 
perfectly formed woodpeckers : a third group, whose 
precise station is not yet known, represents these birds 
in South America. 
(152.) The other genera whose climbing habits have 
induced naturalists to place them with this family, are 
Vunx and Ojeyrhynchus. The firstof thesetypes belongs 
exclusively to the Old World ; and two species have lieen 
discovered : the latter seems to be the representative of 
it in America, and is at present confined to a single 
species. 
(153.) The Parrots constitute the suhtypical division 
of this tribe, wherein the powers of climbing are less 
developed. If any group in nature he isolated, it is this. 
Possessing in themselves the strongest characteristics, 
there is no bird yet discovered which presents any point 
of connection to them : approximations, indeed, are 
certainly made towards them by the tooth-billed barbuts 
