FRINGILLID.E: FINCHES, BUNTINGS, SPARROWS. 401 



pecially on interscapulars. No cervical collar, but a chestnut patch on wings, formed by me- 

 dian coverts. Crown jet-black, bounded by a white superciliary line ; sides of head whitish, 

 but auriculars more or less slaty. Throat white, bounded by firm black maxillary stripes. 

 Breast jet-black, in broad crescentic form, sharply defined against white throat, shading behind 

 into slaty-blackish, becoming more and more mixed with white on belly and sides, till pos- 

 teriorly the parts are pure white ; lining of wings white. All tail-feathers, except middle' 

 pair, and bases and tips of intermediate ones, white, ending squarely across both webs. Bill 

 blackish-plumbeous, pale at base below; feet brownish-black. Length about 6.00; extent 

 11. 00-] 1.50; wing 8.30-3.60; tail 2.25; bill 0.50; tarsus 0.67; middle toe and claw rather 

 less. 9 J in breeding plumage : Upper parts, wings, and tail as in the $ — coverts with at 

 least a trace of chestnut, and tail displaying rectangular shape of white area; crown like back 

 instead of black ; no black maxillary stripes, and breast-crescent slaty-gray ; throat whitish ; 

 bill and feet yellowish-brown, more or less obscured. The seasonal changes of plumage, as 

 well as the sexual diff"erences, are parallel with those of ornatus ; there is the same veiling 

 of black parts by gray, etc. Though so different from ornatus in full dress, the bird is very 

 .similar in other conditions, age for age, and sex for sex : but larger ; no trace of chestnut on 

 nape; trace at least on wing-coverts; peculiar pattern of tail-feathers shown as soon as they 

 sprout, and never lost. Very young birds have curved edgings of feathers of upper parts; 

 under ]iarts quite purely white, with some dusky streaks, and a buff suffusion on breast. Re- 

 gion of the Upper Missouri and its tributaries ; N. to the Saskatchewan ; casual W. of Rocky 

 Mts. ; S. in winter to Arizona, Texas, and Mexico ; E. to probably Iowa and Missouri. Breeds 

 in profusion on prairies from Colorado northward, in parts of Dakotas and in Montana asso- 

 ciated with ornatus ; winters from Colorado southward. Its habits and numners are the same 

 as those of ornatus. It has the same soaring singing flight, and parachute-like descent, " slid- 

 ing down on the scale of its own music;" nesting the same; eggs resembling the paler vari- 

 eties of ornatus; 0.80 X 0.60. 



POCE'CETKS. (Gr. norj, poe, grass ; oIksttjs, oiketes, an inhabitant.) Grass Sparrows. 

 Bill moderate, culmen, gonys, and commissure nearly straight. Wings long, longer than 

 tail, tip fiirmed by first 4 quills; inner secondaries somewhat elongate, less so than in Pas- 

 sercalus. Tail emarginate, witli rather broad firm feathers, not acuminate at ends. Tar- 

 sus nearly equalling middle t<ic with its claw; lateral toes of about equal lengths, tlieir 

 claws scarcely reaching base of middle claw ; hind claw as usual, not longer than its digit. 

 Plumage thickly streaUeil everywhere above, on sides below and across breast ; bend of wing 

 chestnut; 1-3 outer tail-feathers white; crown without light median stripe; no trace of yel- 

 low anywhere. Pocecetes Baird, B. N. A. 1858, p. xx, p. xxxix, and p. 927, misspelled 

 Poocd'tes on pp. 439, 447, and 994. The A. 0. U. picked out one of the places where the 

 false orthograiihy occurs citing it for this wrong form of the name. The error was promptly 

 detected and corrected by Dr. Sclater and myself, and the proper form of the word occurs 

 in all the editions of the Key, as well as in both editions of my Check List — in fact, in the 

 works of most authors from 18.59 to date. I know tiiat Professor Baird felt sore over this 

 solecism as well as tiiat of " Nephocajtes," because he told me so. Neither the spirit nor 

 tlic letter of the A. 0. U. code reciuired us to pcrix'tuate such a perpetration, which was 

 not coiTccted till 18!)!): see Gill, Auk, Jan. 1899, p. 20; A. 0. U. Suppl. List, ibid. 

 p. 117. 



P. grami'neus. (Lat. gramineus, applied to a grass-loving bird ; gramen, grass. Fig. 267.) 

 Grass Finch. Bav-wixged Bunting. Vesper Sparrow. Above, grayish-brown, 

 closely and uniformly marked with dusky-centred brown-edged streaks, and furtlier variegated 

 by pale gray edging of the feathers. Crown quite like back, though the marking is in smaller 

 ])attern ; superciliary line and eye-ring whitish. Under parts dull white, usually noticeably 

 buff-tinged in the streaked areas, thickly streaked across breast and along sides with dusky- 



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