FIELD AND FOREST. II 



Mrs. Maxwell's Colorado Museum. 

 Additional Notes. 



(Continued from page 214 June number.) 



Junco caniceps, (Woodh.) — A very remarkable specimen of this 

 bird, is in the collection. It differs from the usual, and we may- 

 say almost constant, plumage of the species, in having two well-de- 

 fined bars of white on the wings, and in having a conspicuous tinge 

 of bright rufous on the pileum, the plumage being otherwise normal. 

 None of the species of Junco now known are characterized, even in 

 part, by having rufous on the crown; but several tend in their vari- 

 ations to the other character, i. e. the white wing-bars ; this feature 

 being almost constant in J. aikeni. We have frequently seen this 

 variation \xv J. annectens, and an adult male oij. oregonus in our own 

 collection exhibits the same remarkable feature. The fact that this 

 barring of the wings has become a permanent feature of one species, 

 while it occasionally, but very rarely, occurs in three or more others, 

 suggests the question of whether we do not see in this evidence of the 

 present genesis of species ; and whether these characters, now unstable, 

 may not through accelterated hereditary transmittal become perman- 

 ent, thus characterizing, in due time, new forms. 



Junco annectens, (Baird). — An adult specimen, probably a female, 

 since it is smaller than the males in the National Museum and other 

 collections, differs from typical examples in having the pinkish of the 

 sides invading the whole breast and strongly tinging the throat. In 

 other respects, however, it does differ from ordinary specimens. Its 

 measurements are as follows: Wing, 3.20; tail, 2.80; bill, from 

 nostril, .35; tarsus, .78. 



Robert Ridgway. 



The Sacrificial Stone Collars. 



But few persons have visited the hall of Archaeology in the National 

 Museum who have not stopped before these objects, inspired with 

 wonder at their curious form, their neat workmanship, and their un- 

 expected number. They come from the Antilles and the mainland of 

 Honduras, Yucatan and Guatemala and seem to have been in use wher- 

 ever the ancient Carib race predominated. The form is an ovoid ring 



