372 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [1897. 



One point which seems to be borne out by all the specimens is 

 that the body plumage is pretty well renewed before the remiges be- 

 gin to molt, and that consequently the molt of these feathers occurs 

 after the bird starts on its migration. 



If, as Mr. Chapman assumed, the mottled birds which showed no 

 trace of molt in the remiges and rectrices, had already renewed these 

 feathers, we would have a condition contrary to that found in any 

 group of birds which I have examined, i.e., the completing of the 

 molt of the remiges before the molt of the coverts begins. 



Better evidence, however, is to be found in the fact that in some 

 of the molting specimens above described the primaries that are be- 

 ing replaced are quite as fresh as those in the mottled birds already 

 mentioned. 



Why there should be this great difference in the wear of the 

 remiges I am unable to say ; and I am equally at a loss to account 

 for the peculiar appearance of some birds in which the two outer 

 primaries are in a wonderfully better state of preservation than the 

 inner ones, the difference between the second and third being very 

 marked. All the evidence so far seems to point to the same order 

 of molt in the feathers of the wing of these birds as is seen in the 

 Passeres.* 



Two specimens given in the above table deserve special comment. 

 The Margarita Island specimen is remarkable from the fact of its 

 capture so far south at so early a date (July 7), as well as in having 

 so nearly completed its molt. It may, perhaps, have been a wounded 

 or diseased bird that did not migrate northward in the spring. 6 



The other specimen is the one from Tambo Valley, Peru, October 

 31st (U. S. N. M., 102,064), which has completed the body molt 

 while the remiges are just beginning to change. 



* See Stone, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci., 1896, p. 112. 



5 For note on the capture of this specimen (No. 151,633, U. S. N. M.), see 

 Proc. U.S. N. M., 1895, p. 656. 



A specimen of Ereunetes occidentalis taken in San Domingo by Dr. W. L. 

 Abbott, July 11, 1883 (No. 26,158, A. N.S. Phila.), is almost exactly like this 

 as regards the state of its plumage, all the plumage being gray with the mid- 

 dle rectrices renewed and only the five outer primaries of the summer plum- 

 age remaining. 



