June BREWSTER — AN UNDESCRIBED CLAPPER RAIL 51 
1599 
certain of our clapper rails and the seaside sparrows which 
respectively occupy the same or closely similar areas. In both 
groups the typical form breeds from Virginia northward and lacks 
conspicuous markings, being of a generally olivaceous ashy or 
grayish color; the form which inhabits the marshes of South 
Carolina and Georgia is characterized by dark brown or blackish 
markings which contrast strongly with the clear ashy or whitish 
ground color; that which occurs along the west coast of Florida 
is comparatively very dark and uniformly colored. ‘The parallel 
does not apply so closely to the forms of Louisiana and Texas, 
and it fails in East Florida, where the locally resident seaside 
sparrows are the darkest of their tribe and where no form of 
Rallus crepitans has been found breeding. Mr. Chapman’s bird 
was probably merely a straggler from some more _ northern 
breeding ground, for it is, I believe, the only specimen of the 
clapper rail that is known to have been taken in the Indian 
River marshes, although the region has been repeatedly visited by 
good collectors. 
