50 Rives, Birds of White Top Mountain, Virginia. ryaneary 
My opinion is, that the change is caused by the birds being in 
confinement. 
In the Maximillian collection, now owned by the American 
Museum of Natural History, there is an example of a Parrot— 
also normally green—in which most of the feathers have changed 
to yellow ; it is labelled ‘* Chrysotzs amazonica var. domestica.” 
I think from the name, it is evident that Prince Maximillian 
considered the yellow coloring of this Parrot to be due to 
domestication. 
NOTES ON THE BIRDS OF WHITE TOP MOUN- 
TAIN, VIRGINIA. 
BY WILLIAM C. RIVES, JR-, M. D. 
Tue Wuiret Tor and Balsam Mountains in southwestern Vir- 
ginia, are the loftiest in the State, and none of equal elevation lie 
vetween them and New England. They may be regarded as 
orming the limit to the northward of the ‘Land of the Sky,’ 
tor although wholly in Virginia, they are within a short distance 
of the North Carolina line and are directly adjacent to its moun- 
cain region. The altitude of White Top was given by Professor 
Guyot as 5530 feet, but according to the more recent observa- 
tions of the U. S. Geological Survey its height is 5673 feet, and 
that of the Balsam (also called Mt. Rogers) 5719 feet. 
The former mountain may be easily reached by means of 
a road which runs from Seven Mile Ford on the Norfolk and 
Western Railway, over its eastern shoulder into Ashe County, 
North Carolina. With the intention of visiting it,our party left Glade 
Spring, a station on the railway at the height of 2088 feet, on 
July 25, 1888, and arrived the same evening at Miller’s, a few 
hundred feet below the ghighest point. | Among the birds noticed 
on the journey, I caught a glimpse, while crossing the Iron Moun- 
tain about 4000 feet high, of one which appeared to be a Chest- 
nut-sided Warbler (Denxdrotca pensylvanica). About the 
lower part of White Top grow many magnificent trees, oaks, 
sugar maples, poplars (Liérzodendron tulipifera) of remark- 
