THE BLACK-THROATED BUNTING. 327 
Sub-Family Spizinz. 
Bill variable, always large, much arched, and with the culmen considerably 
eurved; sometimes of enormous size, and with a great development backwards of 
the lower jaw, which is always appreciably, sometimes considerably, broader behind 
than the upper jaw at its base; nostrils exposed; tail rather variable; bill generally 
black or red; wings shorter than in the first group; gape almost always much more 
strongly bristled; few of the species sparrow-like or plain in appearance; usually 
blue, red, or black and white; seldom (or never?) streaked beneath. 
EUSPIZA, BonAPARTE. 
Euspiza, BONAPARTE, List (1838). (Type Emberiza Americana, Gm.) 
Bill large and strong, swollen, and without any ridges; the lower mandible 
nearly as high as the upper; as broad at the base as the length of the gonys, and 
considerably broader than the upper mandible; the edges much inflexed, and shut- 
ting much within the upper mandible; the commissure considerably angulated at 
the base, then decidedly sinuated; the tarsus barely equal to the middle toe; the 
lateral toes nearly equal, not reaching to the base of the middle claw; the hind toe 
about equal to the middle one without its claw; the wings long and acute, reaching 
nearly to the middle of the tail; the tertials decidedly longer than the secondaries, 
but much shorter than the primaries; first quill longest, the others regularly gradu- 
ated; tail considerably shorter than the wings, though moderately long, nearly even, 
although slightly emarginate; the outer feathers scarcely shorter; middle of back 
only striped; beneath without streaks. 
EUSPIZA AMERICANA. — Bonaparte. 
The Black-throated Bunting. 
Emberiza Americana, Gmelin. Syst. Nat., I. (1788) 872. Wils. Am. Orn., III. 
(1811) 86. Aud. Orn. Biog., IV. (1838) 579. 
Euspiza Americana, Bonaparte. List (1838). (Type.) b., Consp. (1850), 469. 
Euspina Americana, Cabanis. Mus. Hein. (1851), 188. (Type.) 
DESCRIPTION. 
Male. — Sides of the head, and sides and back of the neck, ash; crown tinged with 
yellowish-green and faintly streaked with dusky; a superciliary and short maxillary 
line, middle of the breast, axillaries, and edge of the wing, yellow; chin, loral 
region, spots on sides of throat, belly, and under tail coverts white; a black patch 
on the throat diminishing to the breast, and a spot on the upper part of the belly; 
wing coverts chestnut; interscapular region streaked with black; rest of back 
immaculate. 
Female with the markings less distinctly indicated; the black of the breast 
replaced by a black maxillary line and a streaked collar in the yellow of the upper 
part of the breast. 
Length, about six and seventy one-hundredths inches; wing, three and fifty one- 
hundredths inches. 
Hab. — United States from the Atlantic to the border of the high central plains. 
