September 1, 1905.] 



SCIENCE. 



271 



sciences, is entrusted, with constituting, at its 

 ]\Iarcli meeting, a committee composed of two 

 home and two foreign members, whose duty it 

 shall be to judge of the value of the works. The 

 committee Avill meet at Budapest in the first fort- 

 night of October, and name from their number a 

 president and a reporter. 



In case of a tie the president's vote is pre- 

 ponderant. 



It shall be the duty of the reporter to present 

 a detailed report on the committee's decision. 



This report is to be read at the general meet- 

 ing of the Academy of Sciences the day the prize 

 is adjudged. 



4. The Avorks of authors on the committee are 

 excluded from the competition, and they are not 

 to be mentioned in the committee's report. 



5. The foreign members designated as part of 

 the committee and who, participating in the delib- 

 erations, will spend some days at Budapest, shall 

 receive a compensation of 1,000 crowns. The 

 honorarium accorded to the reporter for his work 

 is fixed at 300 crowns. 



6. The report is to be published in the journal 

 ■* Alcademiai Ertesito.' The Hungarian Academy 

 of Sciences will pi^blish this report abroad, and 

 will make it known to all the associated acad- 

 lemies. 



In accordance with the above statutes, in 

 the course of this present year the Hungarian 

 Academy of Sciences will confer for the first 

 time the Bolyai Prize, consisting of a medal 

 and ten thousand crowns. 



The commission constituted by the acad- 

 emy from its members and endowed with the 

 powers of a jury consists of Gaston Darboux 

 '(Paris), Felix Klein (Gottingen), Julius 

 Konig (Budapest), Gustav Kados (Buda- 

 pest). The deliberations of this commission 

 will be held this October in Budapest. 



If I may be forgiven for a bit of prophecy, 

 I venture to predict the prize goes to Poincare. 

 George Bruce Halsted. 



Kenyon College, 

 Gambier, Ohio. 



SPECIAL ARTICLES. 

 ON THE PROBABLE ORIGIN OF CERTAIN BIRDS. 



It is my purpose to examine in this article 

 the status of nine kinds of birds that have 

 been recorded from North America, and one 

 that has been taken in southern Europe, and 



to discuss in some detail their relationship 

 and probable origin. 



Appended to the ' Check-list of North 

 American Birds ' published by the American 

 Ornithologists' Union there is a ' Hypothetical 

 List ' consisting of twenty-eight different 

 birds which, for various reasons, have an un- 

 certain status in the bird fauna of the region 

 for which the list is given. Of these twenty- 

 eight birds I shall consider nine, as from the 

 evidence at hand it would appear that together 

 they throw much light on some hitherto ob- 

 scure problems. The list includes Cooper's 

 sandpiper, Tringa cooperi Baird; Brewster's 

 linnet, Acanthis 'brewsterii Eidgway; Town- 

 send's bunting, Spiza iownsendii (Audubon) ; 

 Lawrence's warbler, Helminthophila lawrencii 

 (Herrick) ; Brewster's warbler, Helmintho- 

 phila leucohronchialis (Brewster) ; Carbonated 

 warbler, Dendroica carhonaia (Audubon) ; 

 Blue Mountain warbler, Dendroica montana 

 (Wilson) ; Small-headed warbler, Wilsonia 

 micro cephala (Eidgway) ; Cuvier's kinglet, 

 Regulus cuvierii Audubon. 



Of these nine kinds of birds seven either 

 are represented . by single individuals or are 

 known only from figures and descriptions in 

 the works of Audubon and Wilson. On the 

 other hand, the two remaining birds of this 

 series are known by numerous specimens, and 

 my reasons for including them will be pre- 

 sented as each is considered in detail. 



It seems essential at this point to call atten- 

 tion to the fact that a number of these birds 

 were discovered at a time when field natural- 

 ists were not nearly so numerous as at the 

 present day, and that there may be no doubt 

 as to the reality of at least some of these 

 forms, a number of the types still exist, as 

 will presently be shown. 



cooper's sandpiper, TRINGA COOPERI BAIRD. 



Cooper's sandpiper is known from a single 

 individual that was taken on Long Island in 

 May, 1833. The type is still in the National 

 Museum at Washington. The evident rela- 

 tionship of this bird to the knot, Tringa 

 canutus Linnseus, is at once apparent to a 

 student, and even an untrained eye might 

 readily distinguish their similarity. For the 



