iloDft jBtetos; antj l^ebietPfi^ 



Birds and Mammals of the 1909 Alex- 

 ander Alaska Expedition. Univ. of 

 Calif. Pub. in Zool., VII, 1911, pp. 9- 

 172; pis. 6, figs. 3. 



Mr. Swarth, with one assistant, devoted 

 the period between April 8 and October i, 

 1909, to the exploration, in a twenty-eight- 

 foot gasolene launch, of the Sitkan dis- 

 trict of Alaska. He visited sixteen islands 

 and six mainland localities, and, as a 

 result of his observations, records 137 

 species and sub-species of birds. His 

 critical and biographical notes on these 

 occupy pages 28 to 112 of this publication, 

 and contain much of value and interest. 



Under 'Distributional Considerations,' 

 some of the more interesting problems 

 presented by the life of the region are 

 discussed, and attention is called to the 

 fact, already mentioned in the body of the 

 paper, that certain species of the interior, 

 like Geothlypis trichas occidentalis and 

 Empidonax trailli alnorum, apparently 

 reach the coast by following down river 

 valleys where conditions are favorable. — 

 F. M. C. 



The Linnet of the Hawaiian Islands: 

 A Problem in Speciation. By Joseph 

 Grinnell. Univ. of Calif. Pub. in 

 Zool., VII, 1911, pp. 179-195. 



The Linnet, or House Finch(Car^o- 

 dacus mexicanus frontalis), was introduced 

 into the Hawaiina Islands, probably about 

 forty years ago, from the vicinity of San 

 Francisco, and Mr. Grinnell here calls 

 attention to and discusses the fact that 

 Hawaiian males of this bird have those 

 parts which in California specimens are 

 normally red, colored yellow or orange. 



It is well known that the red colors of 

 caged male Purple, as well as House 

 Finches, change by molt to saffron or 

 yellow, as a result. This has commonly 

 been supposed to be due to change of 

 food, though, in one instance, Beebe has 

 shown that a Purple Finch which had 

 worn a yellow plumage for several years, 



when moved from a "dark cage" to one 

 which was exposed to full sunlight, re- 

 gained its red colors at one molt. 



Mr. Grinnell discusses at length the 

 various factors which may have been 

 patent in producing this surprisingly 

 uniform and rapid change in the Hawaiian 

 House Finches, and well says that they 

 "may lie among a multitude of elements 

 constituting the environmental complex." 

 Temperature, humidity, change of food, 

 and reduction of enemies, however, are 

 not believed to have played a part. Rather 

 it is suggested that the close-breeding 

 incident to insularity may have resulted 

 in physiological inability to reproduce in 

 full the elements which enter into the 

 composition of a red feather. The author 

 truly concludes that "the problem is an 

 attractive one for investigation," and he 

 invites attention to it in a most suggestive 

 manner. — F. M. C. 



Brewster's Warbler. By Walter 

 Faxon. Memoirs of the Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology at Harvard Col- 

 lege, Vol. XL, No. 2, pp. 57-78, with 

 one colored plate (to be supplied). 



Looked at from the varying points of 

 view of the faunal, the systematic, or the 

 evolutional ornithologist, it would be 

 difficult to find a more fascinating prob- 

 lem than the relationship of Brewster's 

 and Lawrence's Warblers with the Golden- 

 winged and Blue-winged, which they are 

 intermediates between. We therefore 

 welcome an article entitled Brewster's 

 Warbler, published in January of this 

 year, by Mr. Walter Faxon. In this 

 article, he not only brings together the 

 existing data and cites the various theories 

 advanced to explain them, giving each the 

 weight which it seems to him to merit, 

 but gives an extremely interesting account 

 of a series of careful personal observations 

 on three Brewster's Warblers which 

 spent the past summer within the narrow 

 confines of a maple swamp at Lexington, 



(155) 



