Vol. XXI 

 1905 



,_ ] Recent Literature. 33 1 



For the Accipiter velox rufilatus Ridgway (188S) an older name is found 

 in Nisus pacificus Lesson (1845), based on specimens from the western 

 coast of Mexico and California. As the western Sharp-shinned Hawk 

 occurs at Acapulco "only as a winter visitor," Mr. Nelson decides tha} 

 for this reason the California bird "may be taken as typical of this form." 

 Possibly a recognizable Northwest Coast form of the Sharp-shinned Hawk 

 may yet be found, with a limited and fairly well denned breeding range, 

 but until this has been made out neither of these names — pacificus from 

 California and rufilatus, based on Fort Bridger specimens — need to give 

 the layman any anxiety. In all probability neither will be available for 

 the hypothetical new form, being apparently pure synonyms of velox, 

 which seems to range across the continent without any satisfactorily 

 recognizable western form, Rocky Mountain, Great Basin, and most 

 California specimens, when comparable as to season and age, being not 

 appreciably different from the eastern bird. 



The common Turkey Buzzard of North America is shown to be sepa- 

 rable from the Turkey Buzzard of Mexico, the West Indies and tropical 

 America generally, through its much larger size and slight color differ- 

 ence. These were noticed by Wied in 1839, and for this reason he pro- 

 posed the name septentrionalis for the North American bird (type 

 locality, New Harmony, Indiana), thus restricting the name aura Linn, 

 to the smaller southern form. The North American Turkey Buzzard, as 

 Mr. Nelson shows, must stand as Cathartes aura septentrionalis (Wied). 

 The same point is made, apparently independently and almost simultan- 

 eously, by Mr. Bangs in his ' Birds of the Isle of Pines' (Amer. Nat., April, 

 1905, p. 190, published April 26). 



Mr. Nelson further shows that the Red-eyed Cowbird was first described 

 by Lesson in 1839 as Tangavius involucratus, which name must replace 

 the now current but much later Callothrus robustus. According to Mr. 

 Nelson the three Mexican forms of Tangavius are merely subspecies and 

 not species, so that the full name of our bird becomes Tangavius ceneus 

 involucratus (Lesson). — J. A. A. 



Schiceleron the Greenland Mallard. 1 — On the basis of a comparison 

 of a large series of specimens of the Mallard from Greenland with speci- 

 mens from Denmark Mr. Schiceler has separated the Greenland form as 

 a subspecies under the name Anas boscas spilogaster. The Greenland 

 form differs from true bosc/ias in being larger, with a somewhat shorter 

 bill, darker upperparts and much more heavily spotted underparts. A 

 large number of specimens are described in detail (including tables of 

 measurements), and three plates, from photographs, very clearly illus- 

 trate the color differences claimed. — J. A. A. 



lOmdera groenlandske Stokand, Anas boscas spilogaster. Af E. Lehn 

 Schiceler. Viedensk. Meddel. fra den naturh. Foren. i Kbhvn., 1905, pp. 

 129-148, pll. ii-iv. 



