FINCHES, SPARROWS, ETC. 279 



C. Throat and breast slate-color, like the back ; belly and outer tail- 

 feathers white ; bill flesh-color (nests in the Middle States only on 

 the higher parts of the Alleghanies) 567. Junco, 



D. Under parts white or whitish, practically all one color. 



a. Haunts wet marshes. 



ay. Haunts always salt marshes, generally near the sea ; back 

 grayish 550. Seaside Sparrow. 



a2. Haunts both salt- and fresh-water niarshes; back brown, 

 streaked with black; cap and wings chestnut; song a loud, 

 sharp, rapidly repetited weet-weet-weet^ etc. 



584. Swamp Sparrow. 



b. Haunts dry fields, pastures, roadsides, lawns, thickets, etc. 



h^. Outer tail-feathers white, middle of the breast with a small 

 black spot (not found east of the Alleghanies). 



552. Lark Finch. 

 c^. Outer tail-featliers not white. 



c"^. Upper parts reddish-brown, bill pinkish flesh-color; haunts 

 bushy fields and pastures ; song a musical, plaintive cher- 

 wee., cher-wee, cher-wte, cheeo-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee. 



563. Field Sparrow. 

 c3. Bill dark brown, a bufFy line through the center of the 

 ground; song an inscet-VikG pil-thk, zee-zee-zee-zee-zee. 



546. Grasshopper Sparrow. 



c*. Back streaked with black, cap chestnut, a white line 



over the eye, bill black ; song a monotonous chippy -chippy - 



chippy^ etc 560. Chipping Sparrow. 



c*. Larger, length about 7*00; crown black, with a white 

 central stripe : throat not noticeably different from the 

 breast; no yellow over the eye (rare; nests north of New 

 England) 554. White-crowned Sparrow. 



514. Cocothraustes vespertinus {Coop.). Evening Grosbeak. 

 Ad. (5 .—Forehead yellow, crown black ; sides of head olive-brown, becoming 

 dull yellow on rump ; belly and scapulars yellow, wings and tail black ; 

 end half of the secondaries and their coverts white. Ad. 9 . — Brownish gray, 

 lighter on the under parts, more or less tinged with yellow, especially on the 

 nape; wings black, inner primaries white at the base, secondaries edged with 

 white ; tail black, the feathers tipped with white on tlie inner web ; upper 

 tail-coverts black tipped with white. L., 8-00 ; W., 4-50 ; T.,.3-50 ; B., 72. 



Range. — Interior of North America, from Manitoba northward ; southeast- 

 ward in winter to the upper Mississippi Valley and casually to the northern 

 Atlantic States. 



Cambridge, known to have occun-ed only in winter of 1889-'90. 



Nest, known but from few specimens, composed of small twigs lined Avith 

 bark, hair, or rootlets, placed within twenty feet of the ground. Eggs., three 

 to four, greenish, blotched with pale brown (see Davie). 



This distinguished inhabitant of the far northwest is a common 

 winter visitant in Manitoba and the contiguous parts of the bordering 



