1887.] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 431 



ON PHRYGILUS GATI (EYD. & GERV.) AND ALLIED SPECIES. 

 By ROBERT RIDO'liAY. 



The coUectiou of the United States I^ational Museum eoutains exam- 

 ples of three species of this perplexiug group, viz, P. gayi (Ejd, & 

 Gerv.), P. fonnosus (Goukl), and an undescribed species from Lake 

 Titicaca, Peru. The two former are represented by specimens received 

 from the National Museum of Chili, and were determined, respectively, 

 as P. aldunatei (Gay) and P. gayi, in accordance with the very general 

 custom of applying these two names, a custom which I hope to be able 

 to show is erroneous. 



The error to which attention has been called has evidently arisen 

 from the circumstance that Eydoiix and Gervais included specimens of 

 both species under their FringiUa gayi, and that the specimen so labeled 

 in the museum of the Jardiu des Plantes which Messrs. Sclater and 

 Salvin examined in 1869 {cf. "Ibis,'' 18G9, p. 285) was nob the type of 

 that species, but one of Gay's wrongly identified specimens. This view 

 of the case is rendered the more certain by the circumstance that Ger- 

 vais expressly states that the bird which he describes and figures {Mag. 

 de Zool. 1834, pi. 23) is oiu^. of those collected by Eydoux, making it 

 therefore certain that it is not one of those collected by Gay. Further- 

 more, a reference to the original description and plate of F. gayi is suf- 

 ficient to remove all doubt as to which species the name belongs to. 



It therefore follows, if this statement of the case is correct, that Em- 

 heriza aldunatei Gay is a pure synonym of Fringilla gayi Byd. & Gerv., 

 and that Phrygilus formosm (Gould) is the proper name for the smaller 

 and brighter colored species which Messrs. Sclater and Salvin, and 

 others following them, have considered to be the true P. gayi. 



According to this revision of the matter, the synonymy and characters 

 of the several species are as follows : 



Phrygilus gayi (Eyil. & Gerv.) 



FringiUa (jayi Eyd. & Gerv. Mag. de Zool. 18:^, ^7, pi. 23 (Chili).—? Gould, ZooL 

 Beag. Birds, 1341, 93. (JVec Chlorospiza gai/i Gay, 1847!) 



? Phrygihts gayi BoxAP. Consp. i, 1850, 477.— Cab. Mus. Hein, i, 1850, 134 (Chili).— 

 ScL. & Salv. Ibis, 1838, 186 (Gregory Bay, Str. Magellan). 



Chlorospiza aldunatei Gay, Fauu. Chil. 1847, 356. 



Phrygilus aldunati ScL. Ibis, 1869, 285 (crit.).— Taczax. Orn. Per., iii, 1886, 34 (south- 

 era Peru). 



Habitat. — Chili and southern Peru. 



Sp. Char.— Head, neck, wings, and tail grayish ; back, scapulars, 

 and rump, bright olive or olive-greenish, lower parts olive-yellowish, 

 passing into gamboge-yellow on belly, the anal region and under tail- 

 coverts white; upper mandible blackish (in some very old mounted 



