RecenUy published Ornithological Works. 547 



A. O. U. Check-List f'Auk/ 1899, p. 98) the Divers (the 

 Uriiiatoridse of 1898) became Gaviidae; wliereas elsewhere 

 throughout these numbers Gavia is used for the Loons, 

 which is confusing. Mr. Abbot H. Thayer sets forth his 

 arguinents against the " Banner-mark Theory/' in reply to a 

 paper by Mr. Ernest Seton Thompson in ' The Auk ' for 1897 

 {cf. Ibis, 1898, p. 159), in which it was suggested that the 

 colours of the upper parts were protective, whereas those of 

 the underparts — exhibited by birds in flight or when raising 

 their wings — were directive. Mr. Thayer's reply is more 

 amusing, perhaps, than he intended it to be. Mr. Outrara 

 Bangs shows solid work in his review of the Three-toed 

 Woodpeckers of Nortli America ; and Mr. C. W. Richmond 

 acknowledges the researches of Mr. Sherborn in some further 

 remarks on the date of Lacepede's ' Tableaux ' : a subject 

 dear to searchers after priority. We have always maintained 

 that the Herring-Gull of America cannot be separated 

 specifically from the bird of North-western Europe, and it is 

 satisfactory to find Larus aryentatus smithsonianus dethroned 

 by a good observer (pp. 63 and 169). 



72. Bangs on Birds from the. Sierra Nevada of Santa 

 Mart a. 



[On some new or rare Birds from the Sierra Nevada de Sauta Marta, 

 Columbia. By Outraiu Baugs. Proc. Biol. See. Washington, xiii. p. 91.] 



Mr. Bangs's fourth contribution to this highly interesting 

 avifauna gives us an account of a collection of 1300 specimens 

 recently made by his collector at altitudes of from 3000 to 

 15,000 feet on the Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta. Sixty- 

 eight species are recorded, and the following new species and 

 subspecies are characterized : — 



Pharomachrus festatus, Metallura distrida, Ochthodimta 

 pernix, Hapalocercus paulus, Myiopatis montensis, Pipreola 

 aureipectus decora, Sclerurus albigularis propinquus, Cono- 

 pophaga browni, Scytalopvs latebricola, Haplospiza nivaria, 

 Cinclus rivularis, Troglodytes monticola, and Merula albi- 

 ventris fusa. 



