Burns — On Alexander Wilson. 73 



cataloging of this bird is but a paragraph in the history of tliat 

 spasmodic, prolonged and, for the most part, sincere striving 

 to bring order out of /cTjaos. Wilson labeled it Miisciapa min- 

 iita, identifying it with an old and very elastic group which not 

 only contained our true Flycatchers, but the Vireos, Blue-gray 

 Gnatcatcher, American Redstart, Canadian and Wilson's 

 Black-capped Warbler. This disposition was acceptable to 

 Ord, Jardine, Nuttall (1833), AuduboiT, Peabody, Putnam, 

 Minot, and used by Townsend as late as 1904. Bonaparte, 

 however, as early as 1824, calls attention to Wilson's mistake 

 in classifying this bird : "A new species of Wilson, omitted 

 in the index. We liave not seen it, but judging from the too 

 miuch reduced figure, we rather think it is a Sylvia.. The 

 specific name is preoccupied in Mu^scicapa, and also in Sylvia, 

 Wilson having applied it to one of his new Warblers ; but 

 as I have discovered that bis 6". iiiiimta (Prairie Warbler) 

 is the 6^. discolor of Vieillot, his specific namie for this species, 

 if it be a Syhna, m(ay be retained." In 1831, Jamison' seems 

 inclined to follow Bonaparte's sugg^estion of Sylvia mimita, 

 and in 1837 Richardson lists it as Setophaga mimita, and is 

 followed by Hoy and Gray. But Bonaparte proposes WiU 

 so Ilia mimita in 1838, and Nuttall in his second edition, pub- 

 lished in 1840, calls it the Small-headed Sylvian Flycatcher, 

 Sylvania pumilia, not only quoting Wilson and Audubon on 

 M. mimita, but Vieillot oni 6^. pumilia, very evidently confus- 

 ing species not identical and neither one referable to any 

 known species to this day. This stood until 1858, when Baird 

 writes it fMyiodioctes minutiis, rejecting Bonaparte's Wil- 

 sonia on the score of preoccupation in botany, and placing 

 it in a genus proposed by Audubon for the Canadian, Hooded 

 and Wilson's Warblers, with the following comments : " It 

 seems to be a perfectly distinct species from any other I have 

 described, and evitlently belongs to the Oscims rather than 

 the Tyranmilas (Claniatorcs). '•' * * The white spots on the 

 tail distinguished it readily from any of cur true tyrant fly- 

 catchers. The introduction of the bird into the genus My- 

 iodioctcs is purely conjectural, although its affinities seem 

 nearest to the Hooded Warbler." Baird is consistent in the 



