the order Grimpeurs (Scansores), Cuvier; Zygodactyli, Temminck; Sylvains Zygodactyles, Vieillot.

The bill short, very much compressed, arched, without dentilations, elevated, and surmounted by a vertical and trenchant crest; nostrils basilary, open; fourth and fifth quills longest; tail-feathers long, rounded. These birds are called Ani and Anno in Guyana and Brazil, and Anno in Paraguay. In Mexico they are named, according to Hernandez, Cacalotototl, and in the Antilles Bouts de Petun, Amangoua, Diables de Savannes, and Perroquets Noirs. In Cayenne their common name is Bouilleur de Canari. Their general colour is black, with more or less of metallic reflections.

A considerable portion of the species are found in Americaprincipally the hot and humid parts, but the south more especiallyand the Antilles.

The Anis live in flocks, and are so far from timid that when they see their companions fall before the gun, the survivors fly but a short way, and then again settle. Bushes, the skirts of woods, and the borders of flooded savannahs, are their favourite haunts. Their food consists of small lizards, insects, and seeds. Many pairs are said to use the same nest, built on the branches of trees, and of large dimensions, when considered in relation to the number of couples occupying it, where they lay and hatch their young in concert.

Size

C. Ani is a blackbird with bronzed tints in some lights. rather larger than that of the common blackbird; less than that of a jackdaw. Locality, moist savannahs and the neighbourhood of water, in the West India Islands, Carolinas, Brazil, Paraguay, &c. It is the Razor-Billed Blackbird of Jamaica of Catesby, the Savannah Blackbird of the English colonists, and the Great Blackbird of Sloane.

pretty thick; it was very full of grasshoppers, beetles, &c., disjointed and partly dissolved.

"It haunts the woods on the edges of the savannahs, and is very common, making a loud noise upon the sight of mankind, which alarms all the fowls in their neighbourhood, so that they are very prejudicial to fowlers; but on the other hand, when negroes run from their masters and are pursued by them in the woods to be brought back to their service, these birds, on sight of them as of other men, will make a noise, and direct the pursuers which way they must take to follow their blacks, who otherwise might live always in the remoter inland woods in pleasure and idleness.

"Perhaps this bird may have the toes sometimes two before, at other times two behind."

Sloane's doubt may have arisen from a casual examination of dead specimens. The fact is that the external toe in some scansorial birds can be directed backwards, but not forwards to any extent.

These birds are easily tamed, and may be taught to speak. Their flesh is said to have a bad odour.

CROUGER, a local name for the Prussian or Gibel Carp. [CYPRINIDE.]

CROW. [CORVIDE.]

CROW-BERRY. [EMPETRUM.] CROW-FOOT. [RANUNCULUS.]

CROZOPHORA, a genus of Plants belonging to the natural order Euphorbiacea. The flowers are monoecious. Calyx of male flowers 5parted; petals 5; stamens 5-10, with unequal connate filaments. Calyx of female flowers 10-parted; petals absent; styles 3-bifid; capsule 3-coccous.

C. tinctoria is a small prostrate hoary annual, with slender cylindrical stems about a foot long; soft, oval, alternate, almost rhomboidal leaves, which are plaited and curled at their edge; small flowers arranged in short clusters, and drooping fruit composed of three blackish rough cells. It is a native of barren places all over the south of Europe, and is cultivated about Montpelier for the sake of the deep purple dye called Tournesole, which it produces. Its properties are acrid, emetic, corrosive, and drastic, like the most virulent Euphorbiaceous Plants.

Jamaica Blackbird (Crotophaga Ani).

Browne ('Hist. of Jamaica') thus describes it:-"This bird is about the size of a Barbary dove, or something larger, black all over, and splay-footed like a parrot. It has a long square tail, a broad compressed bill, and a short thin tongue: but the beak or upper part of the bill is flatted on the sides, arched and sharp above, and straight at the edges below. They live chiefly upon ticks and other small vermin, and may frequently be seen jumping about all the cows and oxen in the fields; nay, they are often observed to fly on their backs unless they lie down for them, which if much troubled with ticks they generally do when they see the birds about them; but if the beast be heedless they hop once or twice round it, looking it very earnestly in the face every time they pass, as if they seem to know that it was only requisite to be seen to be indulged. They are very noisy birds, and one of the most common sorts in all the pastures of Jamaica. Their flight is low and short."

Sloane thus describes his specimen, under the name of the Great Blackbird :-"This was thirteen inches long from the end of the bill to the end of the tail, and about fifteen inches from the end of one wing to the end of the other, both being extended; the bill was threequarters of an inch long, and black, the under mandible being straight, the upper of a singular make, distinguishing it from other birds; for it was arched or round, raised high, flat and thin on the upper round edge. The feet have three toes before and one behind (though Marcgrave says otherwise). The legs are two inches long, and black as jet; the middle toe before is one inch and a half long, armed with a pretty sharp claw, and the other toes proportionable. The colour

of the feathers all over is black. The stomach of this bird was

long claws, and their blades placed something like the arms of a Maltese cross, whence their name; 6 stamens, 4 of which are longer than the other 2; and a fruit consisting of 2 cells, with a central frame, to which is fitted a pair of deciduous valves, and from the sides of which under the valves is stretched a thin double transparent diaphragm. In each cell are two or more seeds, with an embryo folded upon itself, and destitute of albumen. The form of the fruit is extremely variable: when it is long and slender it is called a Silique, and when short and round a Silicle; hence the two divisions of the Tetradynamia of Linnæus into Siliquose and Siliculosa.

About a couple of thousand species are dispersed over the milder parts of the world, refusing alike to exist beneath the severe cold of the arctic zone and the excessive heats of the tropics. A large proportion consists of inconspicuous and useless weeds; many are objects of beauty from the size and gay colours of their petals; and the names already mentioned show that another part of the order consists of plants useful to man.

will be the same embryo with the radicle applied to the back of the cotyledons; and B 2 and C 2 will give the section and sign of what are called Notorhizea. When the cotyledons instead of being flat are channeled so as to receive the radicle in a kind of groove, as at A 3, it gives the division Orthoplocea. If the cotyledons are so long as to be doubled twice, A 4, they constitute Spirolobea; and if, as at A 5, the cotyledons are doubled three times, they indicate the division Diplecolobe. Upon these distinctions all recent arrangements of Crucifera have been formed.

The affinities of this order are with Papaveraceae, Cistaceae, Capparidaceae, and Fumariacea. There are 173 genera and above 1600 species described. It is eminently a European order: 166 species are found in Northern and Middle Europe, and 178 on the northern shore or islands of the Mediterranean; 45 are peculiar to the coast of Africa between Mogadore and Alexandria; 184 to Syria, Asia Minor, Tauria, and Persia; 99 to Siberia; 35 to China, Japan, or India; 76 to Australia and the South Sea Islands; to Mauritius, and the neighbouring islands; 70 to the Cape of Good Hope; 9 to the Canaries or Madeira; 2 to St. Helena; 2 to the West Indies; 41 to South America; 48 to North America; 5 to the islands between North America and Kamtchatka; and 35 are common to various parts of the world. This being their general geographical distribution, it appears that, exclusive of the species that are uncertain or common to several different countries, about 100 are found in the southern hemisphere and about 800 in the northern hemisphere; or 91 in the New and the rest in the Old World. Finally, if we consider them with regard to temperature, we shall find that there areIn the frigid zone of the northern hemisphere In all the tropics (and chiefly in mountainous regions) In the temperate zone

Of the northern hemisphere

548

205

30

634

Of the southern hemisphere 36 Such were the calculations of De Candolle in 1821. Although requiring considerable modification, especially in the Asiatic and North American numbers, which are much too low, they serve to give a general idea of the manner in which this order is dispersed over the globe.

The character of the genera of this order is antiscorbutic and stimulant, combined with an acrid flavour. The officinal species are among the commonest of all plants, and will be found treated of under their respective heads. A large number of genera are natives of Britain. The following is a synopsis of the British genera, according to Babington's Manual of British Botany:'

6. Arabis.

Cheiranthus Cheiri.

1

1, a flower from which the petals have been removed; 2, the stamens; 3, a section of the ovary; 4, a ripe fruit, from which the valves are separating; 5, an embryo.

Owing to the number of the species, and the great resemblance between them, the systematic arrangement of Cruciferous Plants was until late years exceedingly unsatisfactory. It has however been discovered that the embryo presents the most constant character, and that by five modifications of the manner in which it is folded up five precisely limited divisions of the order are secured. The following cut illustrates them. Let A 1 be an embryo with the radicle applied to the cotyledons in such a way as to lie against its edges; then B 1

Tribe IX. SUBULARIEÆ.

forms, as among animals higher in the scale, a kind of inorganic lamina, applied to the surface of the corium, from which it is an exudation. After the fall of the old shell it becomes thicker and very considerably firmer, owing to the deposition or penetration of calcareous molecules within its substance, as well as by the addition of new layers to its inner surface. The degree of hardness finally acquired, however, and the amount of calcareous matter deposited within it, vary considerably; in many members of the class, it remains semicorneous, in a condition very similar to that of the integuments of insects, with which, moreover, it corresponds very closely in point of chemical composition; in the higher crustaceans, again, its composition is very different: thus, whilst chitine in combination with albumen is the principal element in the tegumentary skeleton of some species, this substance scarcely occurs in the proportion of one or two tenths in the carapace of the Decapods, which, on the contrary, contains 60 and even 80 per cent. of phosphate and carbonate of lime, the latter substance particularly occurring in considerably larger

29. Subularia.

Tribe X. SENEBRIEREÆ.

30. Senebriera.

Sub-Order IV. NUCAMENTACEÆ.

Sub-Order V. LOMENTACEÆ.

less a membrane or reticulation than an amorphous matter diffused through the outermost layer of the superficial membrane, being secreted like this by the corium. Alcohol, ether, the acids, and water at 212° Fahr., change it to a red in the greater number of species; of these different agents without undergoing any perceptible change. The epidermic layer hardened in different degrees is the part which mainly constitutes the tegumentary skeleton of the Crustacea. In its skeleton of the Vertebrata; still its functions are the same, and this physiological resemblance has led naturalists to speak of these two pieces of organic mechanism, so dissimilar in their anatomical relations, under the common name of skeleton. The tegumentary skeleton of the Crustacea consists, like the bony skeleton of the Vertebrata, of a great number of distinct pieces connected together by means of in the same way as, among the higher animals, certain bones are connected by cartilages, the ossification of which is only accomplished in extreme old age."

33. Crambe. 34. Raphanus.

CRUCIROSTRA. [LOXIADE.] CRUSTA CEA, Crustacés of the French, Krustenthiere of the Germans, Malakósтрака of Aristotle and the ancient Greeks, a class of Articulated Animals, whose external covering is less solid than that of the majority of Testaceous Mollusks, but much firmer and harder than the skin of the Naked Mollusks; and whose conformation is essentially distinguishable from other classes, especially in the circulating, respiratory, and locomotive organs. The Common Crab [CRAB], the Lobster, and Crayfish [ASTACUS], the Common Shrimp [CRANGONIDE], and the Water-Fleas [BRANCHIOPODA], may be taken as types of different sections of this family.

As in many of the Testaceous Mollusks, the skeleton of the Crustacea is external. It is made up of the tegumentary envelope, which, in some of the class, always continues soft, but in the greater portion is very firm, forming a shelly case or armour, in which all the soft parts are contained. In the more perfect Crustaceans it is complex. The following description of its component parts is from the pen of M. Milne-Edwards, who, in his Histoire Naturelle des Crustacés' (Paris, 1884, &c., Svo), and in the article 'Crustacea' in the Cyclopædia of Anatomy and Physiology (London, 1836, &c.), has given the most complete view of the organisation of this family. Taking the Brachyura, or Short-Tailed Crustaceans, as his instance of the more highly developed forms of the class in which the complex structure is exhibited, he thus proceeds, "The integument consists of a corium and an epidermis, with a pigmentary matter of a peculiar nature, destined to communicate to the latter membrane the various colours with which it is ornamented. The corium or dermis, as among the Vertebrata, is a thick, spongy, and very vascular membrane; on its inner surface it is intimately connected with a kind of serous membrane, which lines the parietes of the cavities in the Crustacea in the same manner as the serous membranes line the internal cavities among the Vertebrata; these two membranes, divided in the latter order by the interposition of muscular and bony layers, which cover and protect the great cavities, become closely united when these layers disappear, as they do in the Crustacea, in consequence of the important changes that take place in the conformation of the apparatus of locomotion. The corium again, among the Crustacea, is completely covered on its outer surface by a membranous envelope unfurnished with blood-vessels, and which must be held in all respects as analogous to the epidermis of the higher animals. It is never found in the properly membranous state, save at the time of the Crustacea casting their shell; at this period, it is interposed between the corium and the solid covering ready to be cast off, and has the appearance of a pretty dense and consistent membrane, in spite of its thinness. It

This skeleton, or crustaceous frame-work, consists of a series of rings varying in number, the normal number of the body-segments being twenty-one. Instances of a larger number are rare, and a less number seldom occurs; one or more rings may be apparently absent, but in such cases they will generally be found consolidated as it were. In the embryo the segments are developed in succession from before backwards; the posterior rings therefore are generally absent when the number is defective. Each ring is divisible into two arcs, one upper or dorsal, the other lower or ventral. Each arc may present as many as four elementary pieces. Two of these united in the mesial line form the tergum; the sides of this upper arc are framed of two other portions denominated flanks or epimeral pieces. The lower arc is a counterpart of the upper. Two of the four pieces into which it is divisible constitute the sternum, situated in the mesial line, and are flanked by two episternums. These two arcs do not cohere at their edges, but a space is left for the insertion of the lateral appendages or extremities which correspond with them. (Milne-Edwards; Audouin.)

The one-and-twenty rings above mentioned are generally divisible into three sections of seven each, and may be considered as corresponding with the three regions which zoologists have generally consented to recognise in the bodies of the crustaceans, under the denominations of a head, a thorax, and an abdomen; but the student should be on his guard against the false impressions which, as M. MilneEdwards observes, are likely to arise from these terms, by their leading the mind to liken them to the grand divisions in the Vertebrata, which are defined by the same expressions.

The cephalo-thoracic portion and carapace first claim our attention, and the latter acquires its greatest development in the Decapods. "In these animals," says M. Milne-Edwards, "the frame-work of the body does not appear at first sight to consist of more than two portions, the one anterior, formed by the carapace, and representing the cephalic and thoracic segments conjoined; the other posterior formed by the abdomen. In reality, the first fourteen rings of the body are covered by this enormous buckler, and are so intimately conjoined as to have lost all their mobility; the whole of the thoracic segments thus hidden below the carapace are connected with it in their superior parts; they are only joined with one another underneath and laterally; and their tergal parts having, in consequence of this, become useless, are no longer to be found, being in some sort replaced by the great cephalic buckler; thus the whole of these rings, in conformity with this arrangement, are imperfect and open above."

The subjoined cut represents the carapace of a Brachyurous or Short-Tailed Crustacean, and the regions of which it is composed, named after the viscera and organs protected by them.

The succeeding figure represents the carapace of a Macrourous or Long-Tailed Crustacean.

The abdomen is most fully developed in the Macroura, or Long-Tailed Crustaceans, in many of which it becomes a very important organ of motion, and in them there is a comparatively small development of the carapace; while in the Brachyura, or Short-Tailed Crustaceans,

View of the under side of the male of Thelphusa fluviatilis, with the male organs. The detached figure represents one of these organs.

On this subject Professor Bell remarks:-" When we consider the almost endless diversity of form under which the species composing this class of animals appear, the astonishing discrepancy which exists in the forms and relative proportions of the different regions of the body, and other parts of their organisation for the performance of offices and functions equally various, and see that all these diversities are produced only by modifications of a typical number of parts, we cannot but be struck by so remarkable and interesting an illustration of the great economical law, as it may be termed, that the typical structure of any group being given, the different habits of its component species or minor groups are provided for, not by the creation of new organs or the destruction of others, but by the modification in form, structure, or place, of organs typically belonging to the group."

One of the necessary consequences of the condition of these animals inclosed in a hard shell is the power they possess of throwing it off. If this were not the case all growth would be stopped, excepting increase of thickness in the shell by a succession of secretions from below. To allow therefore room for the expansion and growth of the body and limbs, a provision for their increase is made by means of moulting, which, as a general rule, is more frequent the younger the animal is, as indeed might be expected. Thus eight moults in the short space of seventeen days have been observed in a young Daphnia. BRANCHIOPODA.] It can be easily observed in the Common Crab. [CANCER.]

In Astacus fluviatilis, the moult, or Ecdysis, as this process is called, is preceded by a few days of fasting and sickness, and at that time the carapace becomes loosened from the corium to which it was attached. The corium begins forthwith to secrete a new shell, which is at first soft and membranous, becomes gradually harder and harder, and is at last calcareous. When all connection with the old shell is broken off, and the corium has completely secreted the new mem

this rule is reversed, the abdomen being comparatively small, and the great development taking place in the carapace, illustrating the "loi de balancement organique" of M. Geoffroy St. Hilaire. The Common Crab and Common Lobster afford striking examples of this law of organic equivalents.

m

View of the under side of the female of Thelphusa fluviatilis, with the tail or abdomen extended. a, b, c, d, e, sternal pieces; f, g, h, i, latero-sternal pieces; k, k, external apertures of the female organs of generation; 1, 1, 1, abdominal appendages, or false feet. The detached figure represents one of these appendages removed from the abdomen; the palp marked m carries the ova during incubation.

the old incumbrance, and becomes very restless, the symptoms of draws nigh. It rubs its legs one against the other, and finally throws inquietude increasing in proportion as the time for emancipation itself on its back. In that situation it begins to shake itself and swell itself out, till it tears the membrane which connects the carapace with the abdomen, and begins to raise the former: then it rests a while. Alternations of agitation and rest succeed each other at intervals of longer or shorter duration, the carapace is completely raised, the head, the eyes, the antennæ, are extricated. The greatest difficulty occurs in freeing the extremities, nor could they be extricated at all did not the old covering split longitudinally and indeed it frequently happens that the Crawfish leaves a limb or two behind; and is sometimes so fettered, that it perishes from inability to extricate itself. The abdomen is the last division of the body freed, and the whole change generally takes place in half an hour. Four-andtwenty-hours, or two or three days at furthest, are necessary for the conversion of the soft and membranous integument which sheathes the corium or naked body into a firm calcareous case similar to the last, and presenting the same appendages, even to the hairs; although M. Milne-Edwards has stated that these last organs are not formed within the old ones, as supposed by Réaumur, but exist ready-formed in the new envelope, turned in towards the interior like the fingers of a glove turned in upon itself.

Mr. Spence Bate of Plymouth, who has very successfully studied the Crustacea, states that he has confirmed the original observation of Réaumur.

M. Milne-Edwards observes that the time occupied in the business of throwing off the shell varies considerably in different species, and that it also depends on atmospheric influences; and this observation applies equally to the number of days required for giving the new tegumentary sheath the consistency of the old shell; and he adds, that in the whole of the species which have been duly watched, especially those found on the French shores, the period which precedes and that which follows the Ecdysis is a period of inquietude and disorder. The muscles are then flaccid, the flesh is soft and watery, and the animals are considered unwholesome and unfit for food. An exception to this remark occurs in the Land-Crabs (Gecarcinus), which, according to the testimony of all who have spoken and written on the subject, are never so delicious as during the season of change.