518 KORTU AMEIilCAy BIRDH. 



Genus SEIURUS Swainson. (Page 482, pi. CXVII., fig. 3.) 



Species. 



Common Characters. — Above plain dusk}', brownisb, or olive, the top of tne 

 head, in one species, striped with blackish and orange-rufous ; lower parts white, 

 streaked with brown or dusky. Nest on ground or in hollow stumps or logs near 

 ground, well hidden, very bulk}-, loosely put together, the exterior composed of 

 dead leaves, etc., the lining of fine rootlets, grasses, etc. Eggs 3-G, pui'e white or 

 creamy white, spotted with reddish brown and lilac-gray. 



a'. Top of head with two lateral stripes of blackish, enclosing a median one of orange- 

 rufous ; no white superciliary stripe, but with a distinct whitish orbital ring. 

 Adult: Above greenish olive, beneath pure white, the breast and sides 

 streaked with dusky or black. Young: Above fulvous brown, the 

 wing-coverts tipped with lighter fulvous, or buffy; lower parts pale 

 fulvous, or bufly, very narrowly streaked on breast, etc., with dusky ; 

 stripes on top of head very indistinct, or obsolete. Length about 5.40- 

 6.50, wing 2.75-3.00, tail 2.00-2.25. Nest in dry woods, embedded in 

 ground, well concealed, the top usually roofed over or covered, the en- 

 trance more or less to one side. Eggs .80 X -61. Hnb. Eastern North 

 America, north to Hudson's Bay and Alaska, breeding from 38°, or 

 lower, northward ; west to eastern base of Eockj' Mountains ; south, in 

 wintei', to southern Florida, West Indies (including Bahamas), Mexico 

 (both sides), and Central America, nearly to Panama. 



674. S. aurocapillus (Ijinn.). Oven-bird, 

 a}. Top of head plain brown, or duskj-, like back (sometimes with indication of a 

 paler median streak antorioi-Ij-) ; a distinct whitish or pale fulvous super- 

 ciliary stripe; with a duskj' or brownish stripe beneath it, through eye; 

 no whitish orbital ring. 

 6'. Superciliary stripe more or less fulvous ; streaks on lower parts darker than 

 upper surface ; throat always (?) distinctly speckled ; longer under tail- 

 coverts with nearly whole of concealed portion (both webs) brownish or 

 dusky ; lower parts never tinged with bully laterally or posteriorly, but 

 often uniformly tinged with sulphur-yellow; wing exceeding tail by a 

 little less than length of tarsus. Young : Similar to adult, but feathers 



Jnranica, and has received in one eollection from the Bahamas more than fifty ppecimens, representing most of 

 the islnnd? in the group; yet every one in this largo sorios, and al.so among those from Key West, is absolutely 

 typieal. T>. hi/porhn/iirn has not yet been traced farther south than Ilibornio, northern Florida, its winter 

 range being apparently restricted to the scmthcrn Atlantic and Gulf States. It would thus appear that tho 

 respective migrations of the two forms intersect, though it may bo that both occur together, to some extent, 

 during winter. The only examples of D. Iii/pm-hrt/um T have seen from any locality west of the Atlantic coast 

 (an adult and a young of the year from " Mississippi River, Louisiana," February 5 and 21, 1870, in Mr. Hon- 

 shaw's collection) are in every respect typical of that form. 



