Page:Natural History, Birds.djvu/176

Rh Scansores, with which they are probably connected by the intervention of the Hornbills, the Family which will next come under our notice. Mr. Swainson places them here, immediately before the Scansores, intermediate between the Finches and the Hornbills. He remarks that those which shew an affinity to the Bullfinches are small (referring here, we presume, to the Chilian Plant-cutter, Phytotoma); while others, whose size and peculiar structure assimilate them more to the Hornbills, are of a size proportionate to those birds; observing that they possess a short, but very strong and thick bill, more or less curved on the top, the cutting margins being minutely serrated like the teeth of a saw. Their food is stated to be entirely vegetable, and that of the most tender and delicate description; and Mr. Swainson remarks that it is singular to observe that the beak in this Family (in outward appearance much stronger than that of the Finches) should yet be employed in procuring the softest vegetable food; while the short beak, posterior nostrils, hopping gait, and purely vegetable food, are all exemplified in such birds as Buceros galeatus, and proclaim the affinity of the Plantain-eaters to the Hornbills.

These birds are confined to Africa, where they subsist almost exclusively on fruits: their movements are light and elegant in the extreme, in this respect, differing greatly from the Colies; they pass with an easy gliding flight from tree to tree. The first and fourth toes being directed laterally, they are said to perch, for the most part, lengthwise on the horizontal branches, along which they walk, clasping the bough with their