DESMOGNATHOUS PALATES 
bone-breaker, a name which is now applied to certain 
petrels. The origin of the name from its destructive 
qualities is quite analogous, as has been pointed out, 
to the connexion between the words hawk and havoc, 
and between raven and ravine. The osprey is a fish- 
eater, but it catches its fish as a hawk does, and not asa 
kingfisher does, for example ; it strikes the fish in fact 
with its talons as if it were a partridge. The older 
type of ornithological handbook used invariably to be- 
gin with the Accipitres, as if taking to heart Chaucer’s 
recommendation— 
The fowles of ravine 
Were highest set and than the fowles smale, 
and continued with the Passerine birds. There is no 
reason for placing the osprey and its kindred either at 
the head or at the base of the avian series, as might be 
implied by such a placing. But what their precise 
place in the system should be is a matter for inquiry 
rather than for ex cathedra statement. That they are 
rather perfected birds in their way is shown by the com- 
plete closure of the roof of the mouth. All birds seem 
to start life with the maxillopalatine bones, as they are 
termed, in non-juxtaposition, which leaves a gap in the 
bony mouth of the roof. This condition is persisted in 
in the Limicoline and many other birds ; but in a great 
variety, which are not necessarily nearly akin thereby, 
the bones have grown inwards and met to form what 
Prof. Huxley called a desmognathous palate. And the 
hawks, as well as such obviously dissimilar birds as 
the hornbills and the toucans, are of this number. The 
hawk tribe, which embraces a vast number of forms, 
such as the vultures of the Old World, the eagles, the 
falcons an hawks, the kites, and the caracaras of 
America, has not merely this character; but they all 
agree in the powerful talons, with strong legs to match 
the strong and hooked bill, the cruel flat head upon which 
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