474 OBERHOLSER, The Genus Puffinus Brisson. ees 
Puffinus cuneatus Salvin. 
Mr. G. M. Mathews, in his ‘Birds of Australia’,! considered 
Puffinus cuneatus Salvin a subspecies of Puffinus chlororhynchus 
Lesson, or, as he calls it, Puffinus pacificus (Gmelin). He also 
described a bird from San Benedicto Island, Revillagigedo Islands, 
State of Colima, Mexico, as Puffinus pacificus alleni,? which Dr. 
Witmer Stone entered in the first annual list of proposed changes 
in the A. O. U. Check-List of North American Birds as a substitute 
for the Puffinus cuneatus of North America. More recently 
Messrs. Mathews and Iredale have reverted to the previous view 
of authors that Puffinus cuneatus, the white-breasted bird, and 
Puffinus chlororhynchus (Puffinus pacificus [Gmelin]), the dark- 
bodied bird, are distinct species, instead of mere color phases or 
geographic races. This view is probably correct, although this 
difficult question is by no means finally settled. Such an arrange- 
ment leaves, according to Mathews and Iredale, only two described 
subspecies under Puffinus cuneatus, viz.: Puffinus cuneatus cuneatus 
Salvin, from the Marshall, Bonin, and Pescadores Islands, and 
Puffinus cuneatus laysani Mathews from Laysan Island in the 
Hawaiian group. On San Benedicto Island off the western coast 
of Mexico occur both light and dark birds, and the Puffinus pacificus 
allent of Mathews belongs to the dark species, Puffinus pacificus; 
while the light bird of this island, if subspecifically distinct from 
that of the Hawaiian Islands, is apparently unnamed. 
Mr. Mathews, in describing his Puffinus pacificus laysani,’ from 
Laysan Island, Hawaiian Islands, based his distinction on the 
lighter color of the Laysan birds compared with the typical form 
from the Marshall Islands. Later Messrs. Mathews and Iredale 
asserted the absolute identity of birds from Bonin Island with the 
type of Puffinus cuneatus Salvin from Krusenstern Island in the 
Marshall archipelago. Although the writer has not been able to 
examine specimens from the Marshall Islands, he has had available 
birds from the Bonin Islands, and a good series from both Laysan 
Island and other Hawaiian Islands, including the type of Puffinus 
1 Birds Australia, II, part 1, May 30, 1912, pp. 82-84. 
2 Birds Australia, II, part 1, May 30, 1912, p. 83. 
3 Birds Australia, II, part 1, May 30, 1912, p. 83. 
4 Ibis, ser. 10, III, No. 3, July, 1915, pp. 597-599. 
