170 YELLOW-BEOWED BUNTING. 



killed one, and more recently lie has again seen the species. Pie says 

 that they are not shy birds, but will let any one approach closely, 

 and are easy to kill." 



Dr. G. Radde killed many specimens of this species in their autumn 

 passage to the Tarei-Nor, and brought back with him a series of 

 twenty-one, and was therefore well able to amplify the descriptions 

 of Pallas, and add to our knowledge of their habits. 



The sexual distinction in plumage is hardly perceptible, for the 

 oldest female in his collection was very similar to the younger males, 

 and differed from the old males more in their feebler form and 

 depth of the black markings on the side of the head than by any 

 other constant markings. Pallas's figure is evidently taken from an 

 old male. Ptadde had only one old male in his collection, and from 

 this he gives us the following description: — 



"The characteristic yellow streak over the eyebrows extends to the 

 edge of the nostril. (Pallas gives a streak round about the eye. In 

 M. de Selys' figure it is rightly drawn.) The feathers of the nostril 

 (hinder edge) as well as the forehead and the whole of the sides of 

 the top of the head are pitch black. From the nostrils this colour 

 extends to the edge of the eye, and it forms a broad and equally 

 black moustache. The same black marking commences at the gape, 

 and extends over the cheeks and the ear, and approaches the black 

 on the hinder part of the head, from which it T is, however, divided 

 by the yellow stripe above the eye. On the middle of the top of 

 the head, and on the cheeks, and particularly behind the ear, are a 

 few either entire or partly white feathers. On the top of the head 

 particularly the feathers are white on their inner web and a clear 

 black on the outer. The black marking from the base of the under 

 mandible to the aural region is bordered with white, which becomes 

 on the side of the neck a slight grey brown. From each angle of 

 the lower jaw there extends sideways along the throat to the breast, 

 a narrow black band, which loses itself in the shaft spots of the feathers 

 across the breast, thus forming a triangular space which is white, here 

 and there dotted slightly with black. The feathers of the under parts 

 of the body have a white ground, with many blackish shaft spots, 

 often fading into a smoky brown; those on the breast are larger, 

 and closer together; on the belly they are narrower and longer, and 

 farther apart, ceasing altogether in the white under tail coverts. 

 The feathers on the .sides of the breast, as well as those of the 

 shoulder, are reddish grey brown. The whole feathers of the back 

 have the same ground-colour, only darker, which on the middle of 

 the back has a reddish tinge. The shaft spots (longitudinal markings) 



