140 FillNGILLIDiE. 



of accounting for the change be true we can well understand 

 that there should be cases in which the waning and waxing 

 of the bill may go on independently of the season, provided 

 only that the bird's food varies in places or at times sufficiently 

 to produce the effects as observed by Wolley at Muonioniska 

 with reference only to the season. 



The breeding-range of this Redpoll in Europe is pretty 

 well limited to the birch-region of its northern parts,* its 

 most southerly extension being the Langfjeld in Norway, but 

 in Sweden not beginning till near CEstersund. In Finland 

 its boundary is uncertain, but it is not known to lie further 

 to the southward than Kuopio, and even about Kajana the 

 bird is not very common in summer. Throughout the whole 

 of Lapland, it is very numerous. Its distribution to the east- 

 ward must as yet be spoken of Avith all reserve. It has com- 

 monly been thought to extend across the whole of Siberia 

 to Kamchatka — as stated by the Russian naturalists, and 

 examples have been procured in North China and Japan. 

 This much is, no doubt, true, but most of the Redpolls 

 obtained by Messrs. Alston and Harvie Brown about Arch- 

 angel, and by the latter gentleman and Mr. Seebohm on 

 the Lower Petchora seem to belong to a smaller form which 

 requires further examination, and is indistinguishable from 

 the yEgiothns exllipes of Dr. Coues.t Further research 

 may very likely prove that each has its peculiar breeding- 

 limits, but at present nothing more can be said with any 

 degree of precision. After crossing the Pacific we find 

 that the true Linota linaria is abundant in the northern 

 parts of North America I — specimens from San Francisco 

 in the west and Philadelphia in the east exactly agreeing 



* It is said to breed in Iceland, but from a specimen sent thence to Mr. Han- 

 cock, the Editor thinks that the form found in that island is most likely the 

 larger one to be presently considered. 



f Mr. Brown has kindly given the Editor an opportunity of examining some 

 of the specimens procured from each of these localities, and thus of correcting 

 the assignment of the trivial names rufesccns and canescens given by him and 

 his friends [Ih'is, 1873, p. 64 and 1876, p. 116) to the Eedpolls they observed 

 there. 



X By nearly all the ornithologists of the United States the name "Lesser 

 Redpoll " has unfortunately been applied to this bird. 



