Vol. XXII 

 '9°5 



Allen, Status of Certain Sivainsonian Genera. 4-OS 



holser has taken the second one in place of the first for his type of 

 Xiphorhynchus . The first of these species (Jcucogaster) is now 

 referred to Picolaptes Lesson, 183 1, and the other (Jlavigaster) to 

 Dendrornis Eyton, 1852. Thus by the restrictions of other 

 authors, two of Swainson's original species of Xiphorhynchus were 

 long since disposed of, procurvus of Temminck having been in 

 the mean time conserved, as Swainson originally intended, as the 

 type of Xiphorhynchus. 



To take the next case, Vermivora was evidently the genus to 

 which at this time Swainson would have referred all of the then 

 known species of the present genera Helminth op hil a, Protonoiaria, 

 Helinaia and Hehnithcros, as they were commonly referred by most 

 authors throughout the next two decades, and he actually thus 

 referred such species of Helminthophila as he had occasion to 

 treat in the second volume of the ' Fauna- Boreali-Americana ' in 

 183 1. This explains his reference of Wilson's Sylvia solitaria 

 to this genus while he designated Sylvia vermivora Wilson as its 

 type ; and he even goes so far as to credit the name Vermivora to 

 Wilson ! This under a recently published consensus would nec- 

 essarily make Sylvia vermivora Wilson (= Motacilla vermivora 

 Gmelin) the type of Vermivora, which thus becomes a pure syno- 

 nym of Hehnithcros Rafinesque, 18 19, and cannot be revived for 

 the group currently known as Helminthophila. 



Swainson's Tiaris was intended as a comprehensive group, and 

 was so used by various writers up to about 1850, so that it is not 

 strange that Swainson should have included in it a species of 

 Euetheia, although he designated a quite different bird {Fringilla 

 ornata Wied) as the type. This assignment was respected by all 

 authors till 1902, when Dr. Richmond (Auk, XIX, 1902, p. 87) 

 raised the point that six months before the generic diagnosis was 

 published the name was associated with another species referable 

 to Euetheia ; to this group he unfortunately proceeded to transfer 

 the name, leaving the original Tiaris without a name, which Mr. 

 Oberholser here supplies, calling it Charitospiza. Under the cir- 

 cumstances of publication of Swainson's two papers already 

 narrated, this seems, for reasons given above, an unfortunate 

 procedure, which we very much doubt will meet with general 

 acceptance. 



