VARIATION AND LOCALITY 



143 



such species within the Antillean region. They are small birds 

 about the size of a nuthatch with a general colouring of black, 

 yellow, and white. From the island of St. Vincent the Smith- 

 sonian Institution received in the late seventies of last century 

 several completely black specimens in addition to two of the usual 

 type of colouring. The black were described by W. N. Lawrence 

 as atrata, and those marked with the usual yellow and white 

 were called saccharina. The collector (Mr. F. A. Ober) reported 

 that the black form was common, and that the saccharina form 

 was rarer. Lawrence remarks, "Had there been only a single 

 example (of the black form) I should have considered it as prob- 

 ably a case of abnormal colouring, but it seems to be a represent- 

 ative form of the genus in this island." 28 There is of course no 

 doubt of the correctness of the view taken by Austin Clark that 

 "atrata" is a black variety. The black bird is in every respect, 

 other than colour, identical with saccharina, and it is even possible 

 to detect a greenish colour in the areas which would normally be 

 yellow, showing plainly enough the yellow pigment obscured by 

 the black. 



We have next the interesting fact that like our melanic moths 

 the dark form is replacing the "type." At the time of Ober's 

 visit the type was already in a minority, but now it is nearly 

 or perhaps actually extinct, though the black form is one of the 

 commonest birds on the island. Austin Clark found no specimen 

 when he collected there in 1903-4, though formerly it was not 

 uncommon in the vicinity of Kingston and in the immediate 

 windward district of St. Vincent. 



The Grenadines are geographically just south of St. Vincent, 

 though separated by a deep channel. In these islands no black 

 forms have yet been taken, but Grenada, the next island to the 

 south, has both normals and blacks. There are trifling dif- 

 ferences of size between the Grenada birds and those from St. 

 Vincent, the Grenada specimens being slightly smaller and for 

 this reason they have received distinct names, the form marked 

 with yellow and white being called Godmani (Cory) and the black, 

 Wellsi (Cory) , but this merely introduces a useless complication. 



28 Ann. N. Y. Acad. Set., 1878, I, p. 149. 



