372 NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 



lateral tail-feathers partly white. Young : Colors much duller, and markings less 

 distinct ; black mark on chest only faintly indicated. Length, males, about 9.50- 

 11.00, females, 8.00-10.00. Nest on or embedded in ground, in meadows, composed 

 of dried grasses, sometimes ai'ched over on top. Eggs 3-6, white, speckled with 

 reddish brown, blackish brown, and lilac-gray. 



o}. Yellow of throat not encroaching laterally on malar region ; color darker and 



browner above, with heavier and more confluent black markings, the flanks 



and under tail-coverts distinctly butfy. 



h^. Larger, with larger bill and smaller feet. Adult male: Wing 4.40-5.00, 



(4.74), culmen 1.20-1.52 (1.29), tarsus 1.54-1.71 (1.63). Adult female : 



Wing 3.95-4.30 (4.11), culmen 1.04-1.17 (1.12), tarsus 1.40-1.49 (1.42). 



Eggs 1.10 X -78. Hah. Eastern North America, west to edge of Great 



Plains, north to Canada 501. S. magna (Linn.). Meadowlark. 



b'K Smaller, with smaller bill and larger feet. Adult male: Wing 4.20-4.80 

 (4.40), culmen 1.13-1.30 (1.22), tarsus 1.50-1.72 (1.62). Adult female: 

 Wing about 3.90-4.10, tail 2.70, culmen 1.05, tarsus 1.50. Hah. Eastern 

 and central Mexico and south to Costa Eica ; north to southern Texas 

 (lower Rio Grande "Valley) and southern Arizona. 



501a. S. magna mexicana (Scl.). Mexican Meadowlark. 

 a^. Yellow of throat sjDread laterally over the malar region ; color paler and grayer 

 above, with black markings less conspicuous, those on tertials and middle 

 tail-feathers in form of isolated narrow bars, not connected along the shaft, 

 as is usual in magna and mexicana ; flanks and lower tail- coverts white, very 

 faintly, if at all, tinged with buff". 



Adult male: Wing 4.85-5.30 (5.01), culmen 1.20-1.36 (1.29), tarsus 1.50- 

 1.60 (1.54). Adult female: Wing 4.30-4.60 (4.41), culmen 1.10-1.22 

 (1.17), tarsus 1.33-1.43 (1.41). Eggs 1.15 X -81. Hah. Western North 

 America, north to British Columbia and Manitoba, east regularly to 

 Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas, sparingly to Illinois and Wis- 

 consin ; south through western Mexico. 



5016. S. magna neglecta (Aud.). Western Meadowlark.^ 



Genus ICTERUS Brisson. (Page 366, pi. GIL, figs. 1-3.) 



Species. 



o\ Depth of bill at base decidedly less than half the length of the exposed culmen. 

 6\ Bill not decurved terminally. (Subgenus Icterus.') 



1 Without much doubt a distinct species. The occurrence of both S. neglecta and .S'. mnrjna together in 

 many portions of the Mississippi Valley, each in its typical style (the ranges of the two overlapping, in 

 fact, for a distance of several hundred miles), taken together with the excessive rarity of intermediate speci- 

 mens and the universally attested radical difference in their notes, are facts wholly incompatible with the theory 

 of their being merely geographical races of the same species. 



