THE IBIS. 



THIRD SERIES. 



No. I. JANUARY 1871. 



I. — A Revision of the Species of the Fringilline Gemis Spei'mo- 

 phila. By P. L. Sclater, M.A., Ph.D., F.R.S. 



{Plates I. & II.) 



Up to the present time the best, and, indeed, it may be said the 

 only authority worth referring to on the American Finches of 

 the genus Spermophila has been Bonaparte^s ' Conspectus Gene- 

 rum Avium.' In that well-known work this and the allied 

 genera of Fringillidse are treated of with unusual accuracy, and 

 short but, in most cases, sufficient diagnoses are added to the 

 synonyms of the different species. In my ' Catalogue of Ame- 

 rican Birds ' I have relied mainly upon Bonaparte's arrange- 

 ment of the genus Spermophila, merely altering the order to a 

 certain extent, and including among the true Spermophilce the 

 species which Bonaparte has placed in the second division of his 

 genus Sporophila {I. c. p. 499). 



Since the publication of my Catalogue I have added not incon- 

 siderably to my collection of these Finches, and during the 

 leisure hours of the past summer have bestowed a good dealjDf 

 pains upon the examination of the 80 specimens of which it now 

 consists. I have also taken the opportunity of a visit to Paris 

 to look through the examples of this genus in the French Na- 

 tional Collection, amongst which are several of Bonaparte's 

 types. Mr. G. N. Lawrence, of New York, has most kindly 

 assisted me in this matter by the loan of a series of 22 speci- 



SER. III. VOL. I. B 



