50 Brewer's Changes in our North American Fauna. 



(IT, p. 392). These claims not being accepted as authentic, the 

 supposed examples being attributed to our Rhyacophilus soUtarius, 

 the Green Tatler was not included by Mr. Cassin in the ninth vol- 

 ume of the Pacific Railroad Reports. The very close resemblance 

 of these two species, T. ochropus and T. solitarius, both in regard to 

 their physical structure and their general habits, — a resemblance 

 so close that, although Kaup refers the two species to different 

 genera, a suspicion of their being only varieties of one species has 

 suggested itself to at least one of my " variety " loving friends, — 

 seems to warrant us in looking for nearly identical habits in their 

 mode of nesting. The recently ascertained fact that the T. ochropus 

 nests in trees, making use of the deserted nests of Hawks, Crows, 

 Jays, and other birds, makes it apparently worth the while of our 

 own collectors to ascertain if our solitarius has not the same habits, 

 and perhaps explains why it is that we have so long suffered the 

 egg of this species to remain undiscovered. I have never yet seen 

 a single well-authenticated example of its egg. All purportini: to 

 be eggs of this species were referable either to sE<jhditis vocifera or 

 to Tringoides macular ins, generally the latter. It may be, there- 

 fore, that we have not looked for the eggs of the solitary Tatler 

 in the right place, and that " Excelsior " should be the motto of 

 those who would succeed in their researches for authentic speci- 

 mens. So far the eggs credited to the T. solitarius bear a very 

 suspicious resemblance to one of the two species mentioned. Natu- 

 rally an egg of the solitary Tatler should more resemble in size, 

 shape, and markings an egg of T. ochropus, which is oblong in 

 shape, 1.50 in length, and somewhat similar to eggs of Gambttta 

 flavipes. The egg of the Tringoides macularius, which in many 

 cabinets does duty for that of T. solitarius, is of a rounded oval, 

 and only about 1.10 inches long. 



Lams canus, Linn. European Sea-hew. This species is in- 

 cluded by Nuttall as a North American bird (Water Birds, p. 299). 

 It is so given also by Bonaparte (Syn. 1828, No. 296), and by 

 Richardson (Faun. Bor. Am. II. p. 420), but the last two are re- 

 garded by Mr. Lawrence as synonymes for Larus delatoarensis, Ord. 

 There appears to be, al least up to the present time, no authentic 

 1 of the European Larus canus in North America, unless we 

 accept Larus brachyrhynchus as a variety of the European bird, and 

 not as having specific distinctness. 



In June, 1876, my attention was .ailed by Howard Saunders 



