Genus — C OSMAEROPS. 
CosMAEROPS Cabanis und Heine, Mus. Heine, Vol. II, 
p. 138, 1860 Type G. ornatus. 
Medium Meropine birds with long arched bills, long wings, long tails with 
attenuate centre feathers and small legs and feet. The bill is long and 
arched, laterally compressed, strongly keeled on the culmen, side slopes 
steep, tip pointed : the under mandible is similar in formation following 
the shape of the upper. The nostrils are circular apertures placed at 
the base of the bill, midway between culmen ridge and lateral edge and 
almost hidden by stiff bristles, probably altogether in life. 
The wing is long with the first primary minute : the second longest, 
the rest successively shorter, secondaries short. The second, third and 
fourth primaries are narrow, the rest broader, all with the tips sinuate. 
The tail is long with the feathers broad, the tips sinuate save those 
of the two middle feathers which are attenuate and lengthened, but 
the attenuate portion bears scarcely any web. Otherwise the tail is 
emarginate, consisting of ten feathers. 
The tarsus is very short and naked, scutellate in front, reticulate 
behind. The toes are short, the inner free, a basal web only present, 
a little shorter than the outer, which is connected to the last joint with 
the middle toe which is not much longer. The claw of the middle toe, 
however, much exceeds in length the other claws. The hind toe is long, 
not much less than the inner toe : the claw is short. 
In 1892, when the Picarian birds were catalogued by Sharpe in the 
Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum, Vol. XVII., he concluded, 
under the heading Family Meropidse : “In the determination of the 
genera of this fa mil y I have mainly adopted the conclusions of Mr. 
H. E. Dresser’s ‘ Monograph ’ of the family. I think that he has recognised 
as many genera as can easily be diagnosed ; but the position of the 
nasal apertures will probably be found to afford characters for further 
subdivisions of the genera. Unfortunately, the condition of dried specimens 
does not allow us to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion with regard to 
tiiis character.” 
Practically Sharpe then used only the characters of tlie tail to distinguish 
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