THE AUK: 



A QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF 



ORNITHOLOGY. 



vol. xvi. January, 1899. No. 1. 



THE DISTRIBUTION AND RELATIONSHIPS OF AMMO- 

 DRAMUS MARITIMUS AND ITS ALLIES. 



BY FRANK M. CHAPMAN. 



Plate I. 



A field experience with four of our five recognized Seaside 

 Sparrows has been the means of calling my attention to certain 

 apparent anomalies in their distribution and relationships which 

 in the following pages I have attempted to make clear. 



The material at my command while not wholly satisfactory, is 

 nevertheless, I trust, sufficient to warrant a provisional explana- 

 tion of the facts it presents. It numbers some 160 specimens, 

 including series loaned me by Mr. Robert Ridgway from the col- 

 lections under his charge, by Mr. William Brewster and Dr. A. K. 

 Fisher, and also the examples in the American Museum of Nat- 

 ural History. The specimens loaned me by the gentlemen named 

 constitute so important a part of the material studied that I feel 

 under more than usual obligation to them. 



From Mr. Ridgway I have received a series of May birds col- 

 lected by Mr. E. A. Mcllhenny on the coast of Louisiana, and of 

 breeding birds collected by Lieut. Wirt Robinson near St. Augus- 

 tine, Florida ; Mr. Brewster sends specimens from the west coast 

 of Florida, breeding birds collected by himself at St. Mary's, 

 Georgia, and a most puzzling series from the vicinity of Charles- 



