316 University of California Publications in Zoology. {Vou 
Colorado Desert (March and April), and Los Angeles County. 
In large suites of winter Savannah sparrows from throughout 
California, west of the Sierras and south to San Diego, the large 
majority are clearly referable to alaudinus as here restricted. 
There yet remain, however, a certain proportion of specimens 
not satisfactorily understood; and these may be representatives 
from breeding areas of intermediate situation to the northward 
from the Great Basin and therefore producing individuals of 
intermediate characters. But this is purely speculative. It 
is of importance to remark that out of nearly seventy-five Sa- 
vannah sparrows examined from Alaska and Yukon Territory, 
not one shows the aggregate characters of nevadensis. 
SyYNONYMY. 
My action in giving a new name to the palest 
of the Savannah sparrows will probably be eriticized on the 
eround that alaudinus has been currently used to denote the 
‘yale western Savannah sparrows.’’ But this name has also 
currently included both the Alaska and the Great Basin birds, 
which I have just demonstrated to belong to distinct forms. 
Bonaparte’s Passerculus alaudinus (Compte Rendu XXXVI, 
December, 1853, p. 918) was deseribed from ‘‘California.’’ I 
have not seen the type specimen, and do not even know whether 
or not it is in existence. But other species mentioned in the 
same paper are stated to have come from either San Diego or 
Bodega; and since the swarms of Savannah sparrows visiting 
the coast region of California belong to the Alaskan form, I 
would restrict the name alaudinus to that subspecies. Of the 
several other synonyms in the genus, I find none that appear to 
me usable for the newly deseribed form. 
