200 Murdoch on Birds of Point Barrow, Alaska. [April 



This species seems to most nearly resemble C. coyolcos, but differs in 

 the restriction of the black to the head, neck and throat, in the absence of 

 white frontal and superciliary stripes, and in its decidedly larger size. 



The type specimen was taken by Mr. Stephens. Aug. ri, about eighteen 

 miles southwest of Sasabe, Sonora, Mexico, and hence very near the 

 boundary. Mr. Stephens on the same trip saw a precisely similar bird a 

 few miles north of the line, and within Arizona and he writes me that he 

 has recently examined two specimens which were actually taken in Ari- 

 zona, thus adding the species to our fauna. 



NOTES ON SOME SPECIES OF BIRDS ATTRIBUTED 

 TO POINT BARROW, ALASKA. 



BY JOHN MURDOCH. 



Mr. E. W. Nelson, in his paper on ' The Birds of Bering- 

 Sea and the Arctic Ocean,'* mentions several species of birds as 

 occurring at Point Barrow, which were not afterwards observed 

 there by our party. 



His opinions are based upon observations made during a hasty 

 visit of a day or two, when on board of the Revenue-cutter 

 Corwin in 1881, and upon generalizations from the abundance of 

 the species in more southern parts of the Territory. The results 

 of two years' careful and continuous observation and collecting in 

 this locality lead me to consider Mr. Nelson in error on these 

 points, and it seems to me desirable that the correction of these 

 errors should be published before the statements have gained 

 currency from length of time and frequent quotation. The fol- 

 lowing are the species in question : 



^Egiothus linaria. Of this species, Mr. Nelson merely says, " We 

 found it with the preceding at East Cape, Siberia, Point Barrow, and at 

 nearly every place we landed." As he does not appear to have obtained 

 specimens, and as we did not obtain it in either season, his statement of 

 its occurrence must have been founded on the supposition that the two 

 species would always be found together. It is worthy of note that the 

 preceding species (^-£. canescens exilipes)Yih\da he speaks of as " perhaps 

 the most abundant of all the land birds .... on the Alaskan shore .... 

 north to Point Barrow," was decidedly rare at Point Barrow in the season 

 of 1882 and was not observed in 1883. 



* Cruise of the Revenue Steamer Corwin in Alaska and the N. W. Arctic Ocean in 

 1881. Washington, 1883. 



