BIEDS OP NORTH AND MIDDLE AMERICA. 411 



Coloration. — Above spotted with fuscous and <^rayish buffy, the tail 

 grayish brown or brownisli gray ])arred with fuscous; primaries 

 wholly fuscous, even on inner webs, or with only an indistinct edging, 

 or marginal mottling, on the latter; pileum fuscous streaked witli bufly 

 and divided medially by a line of the same; under parts dull bufiy 

 (more or less deep) the foreneck and chest streaked with fuscous, the 

 sides and Hanks more or loss l^arred with the same; axiliars cinnamon- 

 bufl'y (more or less deep) barred witli grayisli brown or fuscous. 



Range. — Northern parts of Northern Hemisphere, far southward 

 in migration. (Two species.) 



The type of Misoscolopax agrees so closel}' with '' Numenivs" 

 borealis in essential features of structure and in details of coloration 

 that it seems necessary to place the two species together, the only 

 alternative being to make a special genus for iV. honalis, a procedure 

 which the slight structural differences do not, in my opinion, warrant. 

 In M. minutus the legs and toes are rehxtively longer and more slender, 

 the lateral membrane of the anterior toes decidedl}" less developed, 

 and both the acrotarsium and planta tarsi, as well as both anterior 

 and posterior sides of the naked portion of the tibia, are always 

 distinctly and regularly transversely scutollate. In J/, horealis the 

 legs and toes are relatively shorter and stouter, the lateral mem- 

 brane of the anterior toes is conspicuously developed, and only the 

 acrotarsium is (as a rule) regularly transversly scutollate; but occa- 

 sional specimens show a scutollation of the planta tarsi closely ap- 

 proximating a regular single series of transverse scutolla, and the 

 posterior side of the naked portion of the tibia is often covered with 

 large, decidedly transverse scales. In coloration the two species 

 agree so minutel}' that the pale buff axiliars and under wing-coverts 

 of M. ■minutus and the cinnamon-buff of the same in M. horealis 

 constitute practically the only difference. The bill is, apparently, 

 siightl}^ less decurved in M. minutus than in M. horealis. 



KEY TO THE SPECIES OP MESOSCOLOPAX. 



a. Tarsus distinctly transversely scutellate behind; ground color of axiliars and 

 under wing-coverts pale buff. (Eastern Siljoria, etc., migrating to Moluccas, 

 Australia, etc.) Mesoscolopax minutus (extralimital).a' 



a Ninnenius minutus Gould, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1840, 176 (New South Wales); 

 Birds Australia, vi, 1848, pi. 49 and text; Temminck and Schlegel, Fauna Japonica, 

 Aves, 1849, 111, pi. 67; Seebohm, Geog. Distr. Charadriidfe, 1887, 335; Birds Jap. 

 Empire, 1890, 317; Mathews, Birds Australia, iii, pt. 2, 1913, pi. [146] facing p. 180.— 

 Mesoscolopax minutus Sharpe, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., xxiv, 1896, 371: Mathews, Birds 

 Aiistralia, iii, pt. 2, 1913, 180. — Numenius minor (not of Leach, 1816) S. Miiller, Verh. 

 Land-en Volkenk., 1840, 110; Dresser, Birds Europe, viii, 1873, 245; Ramsay, Tab. 

 Liat Austral. Birds, 1888, 20. — (?) Numenius hrevirostris (not of Lichtenstein, 1823) 

 Rosenberg, Nat. Tijdschr. Nederl. Ind., xxv, 1863, 255; Journ. fiir Orn., 1864, 137. 



