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after caused his death, so that Músa's reception was not so brilliant as he had anticipated. But if Al-walid's treatment of the man who had added so rich a jewel to his crown was tainted with deep ingratitude, that of his brother and successor Suleyman was not only unjust but cruel. It is generally asserted that while Músa and his escort were approaching the capital, he received from that prince an intimation not to enter Damascus in his brother's lifetime, but to delay his entrance until the commencement of the new reign, in order that the Spanish treasures and captives might grace his accession. This command, Músa, from motives of fidelity towards his sovereign, imprudently disregarded; and on the accession of Suleyman, remained exposed to all his vengeance. He was cast into prison, beaten with rods, exposed to the sun until he was nearly dead, and lastly, fined two hundred thousand pieces of gold, a sum which all his treasures amassed in Spain were insufficient to satisfy, and which was raised among his friends. Suleyman's vengeance did not stop there; the two sons whom Músa had left to govern Africa in his absence were deprived of their governments, and orders were despatched to Spain (Aug., 716) to put to death Abdulaziz, whose head was brought to Damascus and shown to his disconsolate father by Suleyman himself, who asked him, with a bitter smile, if he recognised it. The afflicted father turned away at the sight, exclaiming, 'Cursed be he who has slain a better man than himself.'

Músa died in the greatest poverty at Wádí-l-korá, in the Hejáz, in 717, at the age of seventy-nine lunar or Arabian years.

(Conde, Hist. de la Dom., Mad., 1820-21; Cardonne, Histoire de l'Afrique, Paris, 1765; The History of the Mohammedan Empire in Spain, London, 1816; Casiri, Bibl. Arab. Hisp. Esc., Madrid, 1760; Ibn Khallekán's Wafiyatu-l-ayan (or the Lives of Illustrious Moslems), MS.; Al-makkari, and other historians of Mohammedan Spain.)

MUSA, ABU ABDALLAH MOHAMMED BEN, of Khowarezm, the earliest Arabic writer on algebra, whose treatise on that science, 'Al Jebre al Mokābalah' (restoration and reduction), was composed for popular use at the command of the caliph Al Mamun. It contains rules and illustrations (rather than demonstrations) for the solution of simple and quadratic equations, with their application to various questions, mostly of a mercantile character. From internal evidence it appears to be drawn from Hindu writings, with which the author is known to have been acquainted; and the works of Diophantus were not translated into Arabic till after the time of Mohammed Ben Musa.

This work was (partially at least) translated into Latin at an early period; and M. Libri (Hist. des Sci. Math. en Italie, vol. i., note 12) has printed all the part of Ben Musa's treatise which the Latin manuscripts in the Bibliothèque du Roi at Paris contain. The complete work, in Arabic, with an English translation and notes by the late Dr. Rosen, was published by the Oriental Translation Society, in 1831, from a manuscript in the Bodleian Library.

It is from this work that (so far as Europe is concerned) algebra derives both its name and introduction; and the writings of Leonard Bonacci, Lucas di Burgo, and the earlier Italians, bear strong marks not only of their Arabic masters, but even of the particular work before us. Accordingly Mohammed Ben Musa was frequently called the inventor of Algebra, a title to which he has no claim.

In our account of the VIGA GANITA a comparison is made of the Arabic algebra, as far as it goes, with that of the Hindus.

MUSA, ANTONIUS, was a physician of some celebrity at Rome. He was at one time the medical attendant of the emperor Augustus, whose slave he had formerly been; and he gained considerable reputation by the benefit which the emperor obtained, when, having been long under the care of Æmilius for arthritic pains, which had been unsuccessfully treated with warm applications, Musa ordered him cold affusions, and some other means equally contrary to his previous prescriptions. He prescribed a similar remedy also for Horace (Epist., i. 15).

MUSA, a name given to a genus of plants having eatable fruit in tropical countries. They consist of herbaceous plants, having a gigantic simple stem, thickly clothed with the sheathing petioles of long, broad, horizontal leaves, which form a tuft, like that of some palm, on the apex of

the stem. These leaves are of a firm but thun texture, and are undivided; but having simple veins running directly from the margin towards the midrib, and presenting a broad surface to the wind, they are always torn into broad strap-like divisions, which give them a compound appearance. From the midst of these leaves proceeds the inflorescence, consisting of a compound spike of great size, each of whose divisions is enclosed in a large bract or spathe, loaded with male flowers at its base, but bearing females or hermaphrodites at the upper end. The perianth consists of six superior divisions, five of which are grown together into a tube, slit at the back, while the sixth is small and concave. There are six stamens, one or more of which are imperfect. The ovary is inferior, 3-celled, with a double row of numerous ovules in each cell; the style is short; the stigma is funnel-shaped, and obscurely 6-lobed. The fruit is an oblong fleshy body, obscurely 3-5-cornered, containing numerous seeds buried in pulp. The latter are roundish, the size of a pea, flattened, with a hard brittle shell, which is indented at the hilum.

This genus is one of the most important of those found in tropical countries, to which the species are confined in a wild state. The M. Sapientum, or Plantain, of which the Banana, or M. Paradisiaca, is a slight variety, has a fruit used to a prodigious extent by the inhabitants of the torrid zone; and, from its nutritious qualities and general use, it

Musa Sapientum.

may, whether used in a raw or dressed form, be regarded rather as a necessary article of food than as an occasional luxury. In equinoctial Asia and America, in tropical Africa, in the islands of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, wherever the mean heat of the year exceeds 24 centigrade degrees (75° Fahrenheit), the plantain is one of the most interesting objects of cultivation for the subsistence of man. Three dozen fruits will maintain a person, instead of bread, for a week, and appears better suited to him in warm countries than that kind of food. Indeed the plantain is often the whole support of an Indian family. The fruit is produced from among the immense leaves in bunches,

weighing 30, 60, and 80 lbs., of various colours, and of great diversity of form. It usually is long and narrow, of a pale-yellow or dark-red colour, with a yellow farinaceous flesh. But in form it varies to oblong and nearly spherical; and in colour it offers all the shades and variations of tints that the combination of yellow and red, in different proportions, can produce. Some sorts are said always to be of a bright green colour. In general, the character of the fruit to an European palate is that of mild insipidity; some sorts are even so coarse as not to be edible without preparation. The greater number however are used in their raw state, and some varieties acquire by cultivation a very exquisite flavour, even surpassing the finest pear. In the better sorts the flesh has the colour of the finest yellow butter, is of a delicate taste, and melts in the mouth like marmalade. To point out all the kinds that are cultivated in the East Indies alone would be as difficult as to describe the varieties of apples and pears in Europe, for the names vary according to the form, size, taste, and colour of the fruits: sixteen principal kinds are described at length by Rumphius from which all the others seem to have diverged. Of these the worst are, Pisang Swangi, P. Tando, and P. Gabba Gabba; and the best are the round, soft, yellowish sorts, called P. Medji and P. Radja. Some cultivators at Batavia boast of having eighty sorts. Rheede distinguishes fourteen varieties by name, as natives of Malabar. Sumatra alone twenty varieties are cultivated, among which the Pisang Amas, or small yellow plantain, is esteemed the most delicate, and next to that the P. Raja, P Dingen, and P. Kalle. In the West Indies, plantains appear to be even more extensively employed than in the Eastern world. The modes of eating them are various. The best sorts are served up raw at table, as in the East Indies, and have been compared for flavour to an excellent reinette apple after its sweetness has been condensed by keeping through the winter. Sometimes they are baked in their skins, and then they taste like the best stewed pears of Europe. They are also the principal ingredient in a variety of dishes, particularly in one called mantégue, which is made of slices of them fried in butter and powdered over with fine sugar. Of the many cultivated sorts, that called by the French La Banane musquée is considered the best; it is less than the others, but has a more delicate flavour. There are uncoloured figures of the plantain fruit in Rheede's 'Hortus Malabaricus,' vol. i., plates 12, 13, and 14; and coloured ones in Tussac's Flore des Antilles,' plates 1 and 2. All hot climates seem equally congenial to the growth of this plant: in Cuba it is even cultivated in situations where the thermometer descends to seven centesimal degrees (45° Fahrenheit), and sometimes nearly to the freezing point. There is a hardy variety called Camburi which is grown with success at Malaga.

In

The plantain prefers a rich fat soil; for in sandy places, where it flowers abundantly, it produces no fruit.

In the climates that suit it, there is no plant more extensively useful, independently of its being an indispensable article of food. A tough fibre, capable of being made into thread of great fineness, is obtained from its stem; and the leaves, from their breadth and hardness, form an excellent material for the thatch of cottages. An intoxicating liquor is also made from the fruits when fermented, and the young shoots are eaten as a delicate vegetable.

The banana of hot countries is a mere variety of the plantain, distinguished by being dwarf, with a spotted stem and a more delicate fruit. Botanists call it Musa paradisiaca, in allusion to an old notion that it was the forbidden fruit of Scripture: it has also been supposed to be what was intended by the grapes, one bunch of which was borne upon a pole between two men, that the spies of Moses brought out of the Promised Land. The only argument of any importance in support of the latter opinion is, that there is no other fruit to which the weight of the fruit of Scripture will apply.

All the genus is Asiatic; the wild plantain is found in the forests of Chittagong, where it blossoms during the rains; Musa coccinea, a dwarf sort, with a stem not more than three or four feet high, is found in China; M. ornata and superba inhabit the forests of Bengal; M. glauca is from Pegu; M. textilis is from the Philippines, where it furnishes the valuable thread cailed Manilla hemp. There is also in the gardens of England a plant called M. Cavendishii, not above three feet high, and fruiting abundantly at that size, the origin of which is said to be the Isle of France.

MUSA'CEE are a natural order of Endogens, of which the last genus is the representative. They are generally stately and always beautiful herbaceous plants with the aspect of a plantain, and with large bracts or spathes, which are usually coloured of some gay tint. The characteristic marks of the order are to have an inferior ovary, with very irregular and unsymmetrical flowers, whose sexual apparatus is not consolidated. It is chiefly by these distinctions that it is known from Amaryllidacea. In some the fruit is fleshy, as in the plantain; in others it is dry and capsular. Only four genera are known of this order; all consisting of species of striking beauty. The Heliconias are the principal American form, nearly all the others being found in the Old World; of these the species are conspicuous for their brilliantly coloured rigid boatshaped bracts, sometimes yellow, sometimes scarlet, and even a mixture of both. The Strelitzias are Cape plants with rigid glucous leaves, and singularly irregular flowers of considerable size, coloured yellow and blue, or pure white. Finally, the Ravanala of Madagascar, Urania speciosa, a noble palm-like plant, is remarkable for the brilliant blue colour of the lacerated pulpy aril which envelopes the seeds; the latter are used for dyeing in Madagascar, but none of the order are of any important use to man, with the exception of the Musas themselves.

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A few

MUSE'US. Two, if not more, Greek poets of this name are known. 1. The oldest of them lived in the mythic ages of Greece, and is said to have been by birth an Athenian, and the son, or at least the disciple, of Orpheus. Plato and Hermesionax, in a passage quoted by Athenæus (xiii. 597), state him to have been the son of Selene, or the moon. Diogenes Laërtius says that he was buried at Phalerum, and mentions his epitaph. His works, which are lost, have been quoted by Plato, Philostratus, Pausanias, Clemens Alexandrinus, and other antient writers: they consisted of religious hymns, a poem on the war of the giants, a theogony, a work on mysteries, and moral precepts to his son. scattered lines, gathered from the quotations of the above writers, were inserted by Henri Etienne in his collection of philosophical poetry. 2. Musæus, styled the Grammarian in the MSS., is the author of the very interesting Greek poem entitled 'Hero and Leander.' The age in which the author lived has been a subject of much dispute. Scaliger, against all probability, ascribed the poem to the Musaus of the mythic ages. The most general opinion is, that he lived in the lower ages of the Roman empire. Schrader, Schoell, and other critics suppose him to have lived in the fifth century of our æra, and to have been a contemporary of Nonnus, the author of the 'Dionysiaca.' (Schrader's Preface to his edition of Musaus, Leeuwarden, 1742.) The poem of 'Hero and Leander' was first discovered about

the thirteenth century. It consists of 340 hexameter lines, which contain the whole account of the beginning of the loves of Leander and Hero, the daring of the former in swimming by night across the strait from Abydos to Sestos to visit his mistress, and the tragical end of both lovers. Ovid has treated the same subject in Latin verse in one of his Heroides, in which Hero writes to Leander to urge him to swim across the Hellespont, as formerly, although the winter had set in, and yet at the same time expresses her fears of his risking his life. The story appears to have been an old tradition of a real fact.

The poem of Musæus has been a favourite with scholars, and has been repeatedly published, commented on, and translated into various languages. Heinrich's edition, Hanover, 1793, and Schäfer's edition, Greek and Latin, Leipzig, 1825, which is an improved republication of Schrader's edition already mentioned, are among the best. The poem has been translated into Italian by Salvini, Pompei, and others; French by Marot, Gail, and Mollevant, Paris, 1805; English, with notes by Stapylton, in 1649, and again in 1797; and into German by Passow, Leipzig, 1810.

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MUSEUS, JOHANN KARL AUGUST, the admired author of the Volkmärchen der Deutschen,' or 'Popular Legends of Germany,' was born at Jena in 1735, in which university he studied theology with the intention of taking orders, but did not do so. His first literary production, which appeared in 1760, was his Grandison the Second,' a parody on Richardson's celebrated novel, at that period extravagantly admired in Germany. This satirical performance was so well received as to pass through several editions; yet, notwithstanding its success, several years elapsed before the author resumed his pen as a candidate for literary fame; for, in order to eke out his small salary as a professor at the gymnasium of Weimar, he took pupils into his own house, and had consequently little leisure for studious occupation. At length, after an interval of eighteen years, he published his Physiognomical Travels,' intended, if not as a satire upon Lavater's system, to correct by wholesome ridicule the extravagant abuse of it into which his countrymen had fallen. The success of this work induced him to throw off his incognito and avow himself the author; whereupon he became the literary idol of the day, and was for awhile an object of attraction to lion-hunting' visitors anxious to have a sight of the retired schoolmaster who had mystified them by his pleasantry. This sudden acquisition of celebrity and importance had no other effect upon Museus than to encourage him to proceed. Accordingly, he forthwith set about his Volksmärchen,' which were actually what they professed to be, for he is said, while composing them, to have collected all the stories of the kind he could, from old women at their spinning-wheels, and even from children in the street. But if this circumstance in some measure deprives him of the merit of invention, the fascinating charm of narrative with which he dressed up such homely materials, the humour and naïveté which he imparted to them, were all his own. The success of these popular tales was complete, for they have become a classical and standard work of their kind, while a legion of original novels and romances, all favourites with the public for awhile, have now sunk into utter oblivion. His next production was that entitled Freund Heins Erscheinungen, in Holbeins Manier,' a kind of literary 'Dance of Death' (Freund Hein being a jocose appellation for that grim personage), where, in a series of moral and satirical sketches, he shows how many human projects and follies are suddenly cut short by the unwelcome yet inevitable visitor. Excepting a collection of novellettes and tales, entitled 'Straussfedern,' and another for the use of children, Freund Hein' was his last work, for he himself had his summons from him about two years after, October 28, 1787.

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In 1791 a collection of his posthumous pieces, to which was prefixed Some Traits of the Life of the Good Musæus,' was published by his pupil Augustus von Kotzebue. To the epithet so markedly bestowed upon him few have had a better claim than Museus: a mild philosophy, of which his own life furnished a practical example, together with shrewd good sense and quiet humour, pervades all his writings.

MUSCA (the Fly), a constellation so called by Lacaille, being the Apis of Bayer. It is situated immediately below Crux, and between the latter and the South Pole.

P. C. No. 978.

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MUSCAT, or MUSKAT. [ARABIA.] MUSCHELKALK, a calcareous rock interposed in the midst of the new red-sandstone system, receives this name in Germany, and though it is not more carboniferous than some other limestones, yet it is much richer in organic remains than the average of the strata with which it is associated. This rock occupies a considerable space in the vicinity of the Harz, Schwarzwald, and Vosges Mountains, but is unknown in the British Isles, though several small bands of calcareous rock interlaminate the variegated clays of the red-sandstone system. Brown (Lithaa Geognostica') presents the following synopsis of the strata in this formation, as it appears on the flanks of the Black Forest:-Keuper formation.

Muschelkalk.

Dolomite .

Limestone

of Friedrichshall.

Anhydrite

Wellenkalk

Dolomite (Nagelfels, Malbstein).
Pectinite limestone.
Rogenstein (oolitic).
Encrinitic limestone.

Palinurenkalk.

Encrinitic limestone.

Dark clay and anhydrite, with dolomite, swinestone, and rock-salt.

Limestone and dolomitic marls, with gypsum and rock-salt. Bunter Sandstein.

The fossil remains of the muschelkalk participate in the more common species of the Bunter sandstein below, and the Keuper above; but among the peculiar species may be reckoned Encrinus moniliformis and Ammonites (ceratites) nodosus. Saurian reptiles occur in this rock.

MUSCI, or MOSSES, constitute a group of cryptogamic or flowerless plants, of considerable extent and of great interest on account of their very singular structure. They are in all cases of small size, never exceeding a few inches in height, and though often of almost microscopical minuteness, are furnished with leaves arranged over a distinct axis of growth, and are propagated by means of reproductive apparatus of a peculiar nature. They have no trace of spiral or other vessels in their tissue, but are formed entirely of cellular tissue, in the stem lengthened into tubes. For long time they were thought to be destitute of a breathing apparatus, but the apertures through which this function is performed have at length been discovered by Treviranus and Unger, and especially by Mr. Valentine. Transactions of the Linnean Society, vol. xviii., p. 239.) It is however remarkable that they should be confined to the organs of fructification, and not found on those of vegetation.

The organs of fructification are of two kinds; the most universal and most conspicuous is the urn (sporangium, or theca) in which the spores, or seed-like bodies, are generated. If the axils of the leaves of a moss are examined at the proper season of the year, there will be found in some of them clusters of articulated filaments swollen at the base, from among which some one will be larger than the remainder, and go on growing while they are arrested in their development. After awhile this body is found to have an exterior membranous coating, which separates from the base by a circular incision, but which otherwise adheres to the part beneath it. The latter, which is the young urn, gradually acquires a stalk, called the seta, upon which it is elevated above the leaves, carrying the outer membrane upwards on its point, so that when full grown it is covered by it as with a cap; then called a calyptra. The urn itself is closed by a lid, or operculum, and contains the spores arranged in a cavity surrounding a central column, or columella. Its rim is bordered by a double row of processes, VOL. XVI.-C

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In some mosses there occur organs of a second kind, by some supposed to be male, but whose use is really unknown, to which the name of antheridia or staminidia has been applied. These are also found clustered in the axils of leaves; they consist of membranous, cylindrical, jointed or jointless bodies, irregularly opening at the point, and discharging a mucous turbid fluid; they are surrounded by paraphyses, or jointed filaments, like the urns themselves.

When the spores of mosses germinate, they produce a jointed filament from any part of their surface, of which one part rises upwards, forming the beginning of a stem, while the other is directed downwards as a root; from the axils of the branches of the stem-filament the leaves are eventually developed.

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1. a seta, bearing on the apex an urn, from which the operculum is rising, proceeding from an apophysis at the base, where it is surrounded by paraphyses; 2, a group of young urns, among which a few paraphyses are mixed; 3, a cluster of staminidia and paraphyses, surrounded by scale-like leaves; 4, three staminidia surrounded by four paraphyses; 5, a spore; 6, the same in the first stage of germination; 7, the same in a more advanced state.

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The genera of mosses are principally characterised by peculiarities in the peristome, or by modifications of the calyptra, and of the position of the urn. Linnæus admitted very few genera, but modern muscologists have elevated the number to more than 120; concerning the goodness of

which there is however some difference of opinion. In the most recent enumeration of the genera the old order Musci is broken up into three: of which ANDREACE have an urn splitting into four valves; SPHAGNACEA, a valveless urn, a calyptra separating in the middle, and a toothed ring surrounding the peristome; BRYACE.E, a valveless urn, a calyptra separating at the base, and a ringless peristome.

Mosses are among the first plants that spring up on the surface of inorganic matter, at first appearing like a green stain, when they merely consist of germinating spores, but soon clothing themselves with leaves and then by their decay producing the earliest portion of decomposed vegetable matter with which the soil is fertilised. (Bridel, Bryologia Universalis; Hedwig, Theoria Generationis, &c. Plantarum Cryptogamicarum; Endlicher, Genera Plantarum Hooker and Taylor, Muscologia Britannica.)

MUSCICA'PIDA, Flycatchers; a family of insectivorous birds, so named from their mode of taking their prey. Thus, M. Temminck states, that the Flycatchers (Gobemouches) feed entirely on flies and other winged insects, which they catch as they fly (Manuel d'Ornithologie); and our countryman White says, 'There is one circumstance characteristic of this bird (the Spotted Flycatcher, Muscicapa grisola) which seems to have escaped observation; and that is, it takes its stand on the top of some stake or post, from whence it springs forth on its prey, catching a fly in the air, and hardly ever touching the ground, but returning still to the same stand for many times together.' (Nat. Hist. of Selborne.)

Linnæus, in his last edition of the Systema Natura, places the genus Muscicapa, containing the true flycatchers, the Tyrants (Muscicapa Tyrannus), and several other species, to the amount of twenty-one, between the genera Fringilla and Motacilla.

Cuvier places the Gobe-mouches (Muscicapa, Linn.) between the Pies Grieches (Butcher-birds, Lanius, Linn.) and the Cotingas (Ampelis, Linn.).

He describes the group as having the bill depressed horizontally, and furnished with hairs or vibrisse at its base, and its point more or less hooked and notched; and he makes the Flycatchers consist of the Tyrants (Tyrannus, Linn.); the Moucheroles (Muscipeta, Cuv.); the Platyrhynques or Broad-bills; certain species high on the legs and with a short tail (Turdus auritus, Gm.-Conopophaga, Vieillot); the True Flycatchers (Muscicapa, Cuv.); and other variations of form, principally in the bill, which becomes more slender in some, thus approximating to the Figuiers, and, in others, has the arête a little more elevated, whilst it is curved towards the point, thus leading to Saxicola. Cuvier finishes by observing that there are various genera or subgenera which come very near to certain links of the series of Flycatchers, though they much surpass those birds in size, such as the Bald Tyrants (Gymnocephalus, Geoff.), and Cephalopterus (Geoff.). [CORACINA, vol. viii., pp. 4, 5.)

M. Temminck places his genus Gobe-mouche (Muscicapa, Linn.) between Lanius (Linn.) and Turdus (Linn.).

M. Vieillot places the Myothères or Flycatchers between the Chelidons (Swallows and Gootsuckers) and the Collurions (Butcher-birds).

Mr. Vigors, at the commencement of the section treating of the order Dentirostres, observes that the depressed bill and insect-food of the Todida introduce us at once to the Muscicapidae, with which they are immediately connected by the genus Platyrhynchus, Desm. The species that compose the latter group were, he remarks, originally included in the genus Todus, and were separated from it only on account of the comparative strength of their legs. The whole of the Muscicapide, indeed,' continues Mr. Vigors, with which family Platyrhynchus is now united, have a decided affinity to the last tribe, or the birds which feed upon the wing, in their broad-based bills, the vibrissæ that surround them, and their similar habits of darting upon their prey while on the wing. Separated from them chiefly by the strength and more perfect structure of the leg and foot, they form the extreme of the succeeding tribe, in which they are numbered in consequence of these distinguishing characters. The line of affinity between the two tribes may thus be assumed as established.' Mr. Vigors then states that the families composing the order Dentirostres appear to succeed each other as follows:-Muscicapidae; Laniada; Merulida; Sylviada; Pipride. These families are thus grouped by him in their typical disposition:

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He further remarks that the Muscicapidae contain a multitude of species, diffused over every quarter of the globe, and differing in many points of generic distinction; but hitherto so ill-defined, and so unsatisfactorily grouped, that any attempt to trace them in detail through their affinities in their present confusion would be hopeless. They are all however, he adds, well united together by the essential characters which distinguish the type of the group-the notched, depressed, and angular bill, and the strong hairs or vibrissæ that surround its base. In these characters, as well as in their manners, they partially correspond with the Lamiada, from the earlier families of which they chiefly differ in their inferior power and robustness. Mr. Vigors then enters among the Laniade by the genus Tyrannus, Cuv., which, in his opinion, unites them with the Muscicapidae, in which family indeed that genus has generally been classed, and from which he would separate it, chiefly on account of the

strength of the bill, wherein the character of a Shrike is more conspicuous than that of a Flycatcher.

M. Lesson makes the Muscicapidae consist of the genera Tyrannus, Monacha, Eurylaimus, Platyrhynchus, Todus, Myiagra, Muscicapa, Alectrurus, Drymophila, Formicivora, Rhipidura, Seisura, Psophodes, and Enicurus.

Mr. Swainson (Classification of Birds) is of opinion that the Water-chats (Fluvicoline) seem to connect the Tyrant Shrikes with the Flycatching family, or Muscicapidae, the most insectivorous of the Dentirostres; a group, he remarks, hardly less numerous than that of the Warblers, and composed, like them, almost entirely of small birds. Both families, he continues, are insectivorous, that is, habitual devourers of insects; but very many of the warblers (even in the more typical genera) feed also upon fruits, of which the robin, the blackcap, and the whitethroat are notable examples. "The Flycatchers however,' adds Mr. Swainson, properly so called, seem to be strictly and exclusively insectivorous, or, at least, it has not yet been ascertained that any of the species composing the typical group Muscicapinæ ever partake of fruits. This peculiarity of diet, independent of many others, separates them from the warblers on one side, and from the Ampelide, or Chatterers, on the other; while another is to be found in the mode or manner of their feeding. The warblers fly about, hunting down their prey, searching among trees, and roaming from place to place after their favourite food; hence they become ambulating flycatchers, and their feet are consequently large and strong in comparison to the size of their bodies. We need only look to the gold-crested and wood warblers as exemplifications of this remark, even among those species which frequent trees; but in such, as in the Stonechats, Saxicolina, and Motacillince, as habitually walk, the feet are much stronger and the shanks more lengthened. Now, the very reverse of this structure is the typical distinction of the Flycatchers; their legs are remarkably small and weak,-more so, perhaps, than those of any dentirostral birds,-showing at once that their feet are but little used; and such we find to be the case. Flycatchers constitute the fissirostral type of form among the leading divisions of the Dentirostres, and they consequently exhibit all the chief indications of that primary

The

type of nature, as it is exhibited in the feathered creation. These, as the intelligent ornithologist already knows, are manifested in a large and rather wide mouth and bill; short, feeble, and often imperfect feet; great powers of flight and often a considerable length of wing: the development of this latter structure is not always apparent, but it is the peculiar power of their flight upon which they chiefly depend for procuring subsistence. They are mostly sedentary, and only dart upon such insects as come within a sudden swoop, without attempting to pursue their game further, if unsuccessful in the first instance: they return, in fact, to the spot they left, or to another very near, and there await patiently until another insect passes within the proper distance. This habit of feeding at once explains the reason of the feet being so small and weak, by showing that they

are merely used to support the body; or, at least, that they are not employed in constant exercise or exertion, as in the generality of other birds. Other characters accompany these, no less indicative of birds which feed exclusively upon the wing: the bill is always considerably depressed or flattened, particularly at its base; and the sides of the mouth are defended with stiff bristles, to confine the struggles of their prey.'

Mr. Swainson thinks that the primary divisions appear to be represented by the genera Eurylaimus, Muscicapa, Fluvicola, Psaris, and Querula, and these, according to his views, constitute the types of so many subfamilies, very unequal indeed in their contents, yet blending sufficiently into each other to point out their circular succession. He considers the first two of these to be the typical and subtypical groups; and the three next to be aberrant.

The Prince of Musignano (Geographical and Compara tive List) places the Muscicapidae between the Turdidae and the Laniada; and he makes the Muscicapidæ consist of the following subfamilies and genera.

a.

Muscicapna.

Genera:-Setophaga, Sw. Tyrannula, Sw. Tyrannus, Vieill. Milvulus, Sw. Butalis, Boie. Muscicapa, Linn. Erythrosterna, Bonap.

b. Vireoninæ.

Icteria, Vieill.

Vireo, Vieill. Vireosylva,

Genera
Bonap.
In considering this arrangement, the student should
remember that it only applies to the birds of Europe and
North America.

Mr. Swainson thus defines the family:

Stature small. Bill considerably depressed its entire length, broad: the edge of the upper mandible folding over that of the lower; the tip abruptly bent and notched. Rictus wide, defended with strong rigid bristles pointing forwards Feet almost always short (except in the rasorial types, where of course they are longer), small, and weak. Feed solely upon insects captured during flight. Habits sedentary.

Subfamily Querulinæ.

Bill strong, broad, much depressed; gape wide. Rictus with strong bristles. Feet short, resembling those of the typical Ampeline. Lateral scales minute. (Sw.)

Mr. Swainson is of opinion that the genus Querula is the type of this family, and he observes that by some of the Linnean writers this remarkable bird is classed as a Muscicape; while by others, even among the moderns, it is considered an Ampelis; and he thinks that both of these opinions may be reconciled, by viewing it as it stands in his arrangement-as the connecting link between these families. He remarks that all the other Flycatchers, according to his system, so far as we yet know, feed entirely upon insects; but there is unquestionable testimony that this species lives also upon fruits, thus uniting in itself the characteristic of the two families which it connects. In the bill, he adds, there is much of the form and strength of that of Psaris, but it is wide and more depressed; whilst the stiff bristles at the rictus betray its insectivorous habit: the feet are remarkably short for the size of the bird, and are calculated characters, in the opinion of Mr. Swainson, not only point only, like those of the Ampelidæ, for perching. All these of the families of Muscicapidae and Ampelidæ. out this genus as the fissirostral type, but perfect the union

Genera.

Querua, Vieill. and Lathria, Sw. Of these we select the former as an example.

Generic Character.-Bill large, broad, and strong. Gonys long and straight. Nostrils concealed by incumbent reflected feathers. Wings long and broad, fourth quill longest. Toes unequal; inner toe shortest, of equal length with the hind toe. Tail even.

Example, Querula rubricollis, The Common Piahau.
Description.-Black with a purple throat. It is the
Muscicapa rubricollis of Gmelin.

Locality and Habits.-America, where they go in troops
in the woods in pursuit of insects.
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