66 Brewster on Birds from Arizona and New Mexico. 



by Mr. Henshaw in 1S74. in fall feathering. My birds have the 

 breast-spotting decidedly more distinct than in H. palmeri but 

 the color of the arrow-heads is not darker than that of the back. 



After reading all that has been written on the subject and care- 

 fully comparing bendirei with cinercus, I am inclined to differ 

 from my friend Mr. Henshaw and to agree with Dr. Cones, in 

 considering bendirei a distinct species. Its close relationship to 

 einereus is evident enough, in spite of the very different coloring 

 of the two birds. But Mr. Henshaw's statement that " the wide 

 separation of the two forms in question, and the fact that the Cape 

 Saint Lucas bird is restricted to the coast, while the Bcndire's 

 Thrush inhabits the dry. almost waterless, plains of the interior, 

 will sufficiently account for the discrepancies between them." seems 

 to me rather to concern the original derivation of the Arizona 

 form than to affect its specific standing. The very character of 

 the distribution of the two birds favors the assumption that they 

 are distinct. So far as we know, the Arizona Thrashers are con- 

 fined to a verv limited area, and if. as the evidence goes to show. 

 their colony is absolutely cut off from the equally restricted one 

 of cinereiis, there can, of course, be no intergradation between 

 the two. and the well-marked characters of bendirei must entitle 

 it to specific rank. 



2. Harporhynchus lecontei {Lawr.) Bp. Leconte's 

 Thrasher. — A fine adult male taken near Phoenix, Feb. 21, 

 1S80, is in the present collection and brings the number of known 

 specimens up to five. The species is apparently a very rare one in 

 Arizona. Mr. Stephens has seen only two individuals during sev- 

 eral years' experience. He writes : "I took this specimen ten miles 

 north-west of Phoenix. The locality was a brushy desert with 

 large cacti. At the time, it was singing in a similar manner to 

 H. palmer i i, only very sweetly. I should consider them excellent 

 songsters. They do not mock other birds and the song is unlike 

 that of H. redivivus. A short time afterwards I saw two other 

 Thrushes, one of which was lecontei. They were flitting through 

 the brush and on shooting I got the wrong one. an H. pal/ncri. 

 The latter was abundant in the locality and H. bendirei com- 

 mon." 



In the " Key to North American Birds" Dr. Coues reduced 

 Leconte's Thrasher to a variety of H. redivivus. and this ar- 

 rangement, also followed in his later works, has been generally 



