15S bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



Ind.ivvJ.vxd variations: — Spring males. Red of the crest sometimes pure 

 dark wine color, sometimes strongly tinged with blackish. Red of the mider 

 parts sometimes pure and continuous from the chin to the crissum, sometimes 

 interrupted by ashy ou the breast and lower abdomen. Red of the capistrum 

 usually pure, but occasionally tinged very slightly with blackish. 



Spring fenudes. Capistrum, throat, breast, abdomen, crissum, and under 

 tail coverts sometimes plain, sometimes tinged with red. 



Winter plumage : — Adult males. Crown, back, sides of neck, and entire 

 under parts, except the throat, strongly tinged with yellowish brown or brown- 

 ish olive, which, over the red of the median lower parts, forms merely a nar- 

 row tipping at the ends of the feathers. 



Young males. Diflfering from adults in autumn only in having the red 

 more restricted and often almost wholly concealed, ou the forehead, as well as 

 over most of the breast and lower abdomen, by the brownish tipping above 

 mentioned. 



Females. "Wings and tail grayer than in spring birds, the general coloring 

 clearer and richer, the upper parts brownish ashy, the lower parts rich buff 

 tinged with brownish ashy on the breast and sides of neck and body ; the 

 upper tail coverts, inner secondaries, and greater and middle wing coverts, 

 tipped with light brownish of the same shade as the back, this brownish, on 

 the wing coverts, forming two ill-defined bands. If my series of autumnal 

 females contains both young and adults I am unable to distinguish them. 



This bird appears to be strictly confined to the Cape Region, where it is 

 nowhere very common. Mr. Belding considered it more numerous in the 

 interior than near the coast, but Mr. Frazar found it in the greatest numbers 

 at Triunfo and San Jose del Cabo, the latter place being, of course, directly on 

 the coast. About La Paz, however, only a single specimen was seen, and but 

 one was obtained on the Sierra de la Laguna. At Santiago four were taken, 

 and there is a skin in the collection from San Jose del Rancho. The bird is 

 doubtless resident wherever found. ^ 



No representative of this genus is known to inhabit any part of California, 

 but the closely related P. sinuata occurs in southern Arizona and western 

 Mexico. 



Zamelodia melanocephala (Swains.). 

 Black-headed Grosbeak. 



Guiraca melanocephala Baird, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1859, 301, 304 (Cape 



St. Lucas). 

 Goniaphea melanocephala CouES and Streets, Bull. U. S. Nat. Mas., no. 7, 1877, 11 



(Pichilinque Bay). 

 Zamelodia melanocephala Belding, Proc. IT. S. Nat. Mus., V. 1883, 541 (Cape 



Kegion). 

 Habia melanocephala Betant, Proc. Calif. Acad. Sci., 2d ser., IL 1889, 304 (Cape 



Region). 



