. Key to North American birds; containing a concise account of every species of living and fossil bird at present known from the continent north of the Mexican and United States boundary . ing and hold-ing detached objects in some, as the parrots, birds of prey, and a fewothers. The modifications of the leg and foot are more numerous, morediverse, and more important, in their bearing upon taxonomy, than thoseof either bill, wing or tail. § 72. (a.) The bony framework. (Fig. 8, somewhat diagrammatic il-lustration, talvcn from a loons right leg.) This ordinarily consists of twentybones, of which
. Key to North American birds; containing a concise account of every species of living and fossil bird at present known from the continent north of the Mexican and United States boundary . ing and hold-ing detached objects in some, as the parrots, birds of prey, and a fewothers. The modifications of the leg and foot are more numerous, morediverse, and more important, in their bearing upon taxonomy, than thoseof either bill, wing or tail. § 72. (a.) The bony framework. (Fig. 8, somewhat diagrammatic il-lustration, talvcn from a loons right leg.) This ordinarily consists of twentybones, of which fourteen are toe-bones, one is a little bone connecting thehind toe with the rest of the foot, one a little bone in front of the knee-joint, aud four are the principal bones from the hip-joint down to the rootsof the toes. The first is the femur or thigh-bone, a, reaching from hip a, toknee b ; a large terete bone, corresponding to the humerus of the come two bones, b, the tibia, or piiucipal (and inner) leg-bone, and c,the fibula, or lesser (aud outer) leg-bone; both these joint with the femurabove, and in front of this, the knee-joint, there is in many or most birds a. Fio. 8. Bones of leg and foot. little knee-pan, or knee-cap : the patella, p. The tibia runs to the heel, c,and there has an enlarged extremity to joint with the next bone: but thefibula is only a slender spicula not reaching the heel, but ending in a sharppoint part wa} down the leg, and partly soldered with the tibia. It is onlyin a few of the lowest birds, that the tibia runs up to a point above the knee-joint, as shown in this figure : ordinarily, it ends at the knee itself. Theportion of the leg represented by the femur, or from a to b, is the thigh ;that represented by tibia and fibula is the leg or CRUS ; leg proper, there-fore, is from knee to heel, or b to c only. KEY TO N. A. miiDS. 6 42 BONES OF LEG AND FOOT. (b.) Now a birds legs are not like ours, separate from the body from thehip down
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