^94 General Notes. [.April 



on the lower step, the birds came up and performed within ten feet of 

 him. He kept perfectly quiet. The male called from a low branch over- 

 head, while the female strutted on the gravel path below, with wings 

 and tail outspread and head lowered, and sidestepped back and forth, 

 half way around to the right, then to the left, all the time uttering a curi- 

 ous gutteral chuckle. This performance was kept up for ten or fifteen 

 minutes. 



One morning he saw them sleeping on a log. They were sitting close 

 together facing each other, their heads about half way along side of one 

 another, while each had one wing spread over the other's head. This 

 male bird had a peculiar call which could be recognized from the other 

 Whip-poor-wills which were heard in the woods nearby, and Mr. Boehm, 

 who is a close observer of nature, is quite sure that the same pair come to 

 visit him every summer.' — Henry K. Coale, Highland Park, III. 



Aeronautes melanoleucus (Baird) versus Aeronautes saxatalis (Wood- 

 house). — The White-throated Swift of western North America is 

 commonly called Aeronautes melanoleucus (Baird) (Cypselus melanoleucus 

 Baird, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., VII, June, 1854, p. 118; "Camp 123, 

 west of San Francisco Mountains" [on Bill Williams River, west of Ives 

 Peak, Lat. 34° 15' N., Arizona]). As is well known, there is an earlier 

 name in Acanthylis saxatalis [sic] Woodhouse, in Sitgreaves' 'Report of 

 an Expedition down the Zuni and Colorado Rivers,' 1853, p. 64, based 

 on a bird seen at "Inscription Rock, New Mexico." This name has been 

 rejected chiefly because no specimen was obtained and because the descrip- 

 tion given was not entirely accurate. This description is as follows: 



"Head and rump white; back, tail, wings, and sides black, beneath 

 white; upper tail coverts black; under coverts white; about the size of 

 A. pelasgia, and in its mode of flight the same." 



The chief discrepancies in this account are the statements that the 

 head and rump are white, and that the under tail-coverts are white. Any 

 one who has seen this species in life, however, will readily recall that when 

 the bird is flying the white flank patches spread out both above and below, 

 so that the rump and even the under tail-coverts also, have all the appear- 

 ance of being white, which circumstance readily explains these two dis- 

 crepancies in Woodhouse's description of a bird seen in flight. The head 

 is in some individuals very light colored, and in certain lights might readily 

 at a distance appear superficially white. There can be no doubt at all 

 that the White-throated Swift was the bird seen at Inscription Rock by 

 Dr. Woodhouse and described as above; and this most writers on the 

 subject readily admit. Furthermore, there is no rule of nomenclature 

 that provides for the rejection of a name based on the printed description 

 of an animal only seen in life, nor for the rejection of a name if certainly 

 identifiable even though the description be partly inaccurate. We see, 

 therefore, no reason for not hereafter calling our Wliite-throated Swift 



