^0.3.] ALLEN ON THE GENUS BASSARIS. 333 



Bassaris was killed in a lieu-roost, near Washington, after it had coin- 

 mitted great devastation among the ponltry of the neighborhood. It 

 had evidently escaped from confinement, as shown by the marks of a 

 collar aronnd the neck. There was, of conrse, no indication whence it 

 came originally, bnt it was supposed to have been brought from Cali- 

 fornia. This specimen is somewhat different from those obtained in 

 Mexico and Texas, although perhaps not specifically distinct. The tail 

 is strikingly different in having the black rings fewer in number and 

 of much greater extent compared with the white portion. Of these 

 black rings there are only five distinctly marked ones besides the tip, 

 and the last or subterminal one is more than two inches long instead of 

 about one. Below the black ring is nearly complete, separated only for 

 the thickness of the vertebme by the white of the under surface. There 

 is no appreciable difference in the colors of the remaining x^ortions of 

 the body. The ears are decidedly smaller. Very considerable differ- 

 ences are discernible between the skull of this specimen and the others; 

 the cranium is broader, but more constricted behind the orbital pro- 

 cesses of the frontal bone ; the distance between the zygomata is con- 

 siderably greater, and the temporal crests of opposite sides much closer 

 together. The pterygoid bones, also, are further apart. The proportion 

 of greatest breadth of skull to length is as G3 to 100 instead of 50, as in 

 No. 4 [female], from Texas. Should the examination of furtlier speci- 

 mens show these distinctions to be such as to indicate a different species, 

 it might be called Bassaris raptor. ''^ In passing, I may add that the 

 examination of more material shows that the cranial differences here 

 indicated are not important, and show mainly only the usual variations 

 accompanying differences of age in Bassa^^is astuta. The color of the 

 tail very nearly coincides with that of a specimen before me from Oregon, 

 with which it so much more nearly agrees than with Texas examples 

 that I have little doubt that the supposed Californian origin of Bassaris 

 raptor is its correct locality. The wide separation of the pterygoid 

 bones is certainly exceptional, but is probably strictly individual, as 

 I find a perfectly parallel variation in this highly variable feature in the 

 skulls of B. sumicJirasti. Consequently in Bassaris raptor we have the 

 earliest synonym of B. astuta. 



In 1860, M. De Saussure described and figured (Eev. et Mag. de Zool., 

 2« ser., xii, Jan., 18G0, p. 7, pi. i, animal, fig. uncolored), a second 

 species, under the name Bassaris sumichrasti, based on a single very old 

 individual collected by himself in Mexico. Although De Saussure's 

 description is explicit and detailed, and notwithstanding that in his 

 careful comparison of the new species with B. astuta (of which he had a 

 large suite representing all ages), he clearly set forth all the leading 

 points of difference, Dr. Peters, in 1874 (Monatsb. der k. Akad. der 

 Wissensch. zu Berlin, 1874, p. 704, pll. i, ii, meeting of Nov. 10, 1874), 

 referred B. sumichrasti of De Saussure doubtfully to B. raptor, Baird, 

 at the same time redescribiug B. sumicJirasti under the name Bassaris 

 variabilis. At all events, he says : " Es war bis jetzt mit Sicherheit nur 



