198 Universifji of Calif ornia PuhJkaiions in Zoology. [Vol. 7 



The type of niaiUiardi ineavSures as follows: wing, 63.9 mm. ; 

 tail, 61.5; tarsus, 21; eulmen, 13; bill from nostril, 9.6; depth of 

 bill, 7.5 ; width of maxilla at nostrils, 6.3. 



The only material at hand of the new form is the series of 

 twenty-five skins placed at my disposal by ]Mr. Joseph ]\lailliard. 

 all taken by him on or near the Raneho Dos Rios. located at the 

 confluence of the Tuolumne and San Joaquin rivers in Stanislaus 

 County, near IModesto. I have no notion, whatever, as to what 

 may be the subspecific status of song sparrows through the San 

 Joaquin Valley either north or south of this point. Confluence 

 of maiUiardi with maxiUaris to the northward, and with heer- 

 manni to the southward, may be presumed to exist. But I have 

 not the least grounds for proof of true intergradation. Inter- 

 gradation between forms of Melospiza has been confidently as- 

 sumed in several cases, when subsequent careful field work has 

 shown none to exist; for instance, between M. c. heermatDii and 

 ill. c. samuelis, and M. c. salfonis and 31. c. cooperi. The writer 

 has as yet no access to song sparrows from the bed of the great 

 San Joaquin-Sacramento basin, except from two limited localities 

 — the Suisun marshes and the vicinity of Modesto. 



Besides the twenty-five examples of M. m. maiUiardi forming 

 the basis of this study, there are three other skins in the Mail- 

 liard collection from the ^IcHlesto region, which I refer with very 

 little hesitation to M. m. maxiUaris. 



It might be urged that these three specimens are merely indi- 

 vidual extremes of the form the mode of which coincides with 

 the characterization of maiUiardi, as given above. Two reasons 

 may, however, be given for considering these examples )naxiUaris 

 rather than maiUiardi with which they occurred. 



(1) In the Museum series of fifty-five song sparrows from 

 the habitat of maxiUaris. there is not one individual varying so 

 far toward the typical maiUiardi that any question regarding its 

 determination as maxiUaris might possibly be raised. The reverse, 

 namely that specimens exactly like maxiUaris might occur as 

 variants of maiUiardi, is therefore not to be expected. This is 

 particularly improbal)k' when we consider that there are but 

 twenty-eight specimens all told from the ^lodesto region. 



(2) The three sjjeciineiis in (|ues1i(in ai'c of midwinter dates' 



