404 U. S. p. K. R. EXP. AND SURVEYS — ZOOLOGY — GENERAL REPORT. 



by a black one of about the same length which extends over the lateral tufts. The white of the 

 forehead, however, is continued through the upper half of the eye and under the black tuft. 

 The side of the head and neck behind the black is white, interrupted by a crescentic patch oi 

 brownish ash bordering the ear coverts behind. The throat, however, usually remains yellow. 



The very young bird is dusky brown, spotted with whitish above ; beneath white, with an 

 indication of the black pectoral and cheek patches. 



The pfeceeding description is taken from specimens collected in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, 

 the former being winter visitors only in that State. They breed in Wisconsin and^ perhaps, 

 fuither south on the same meridian. 



After a protracted examination of a large number of specimens, I have found it impossible 

 to detect any tangible differences between the shore larks of the east and the west, and am very 

 much inclined to consider them as the same species. There are the same proportions, the same 

 colors, and nearly the same size ; in fact, the differences which exist are not more than might 

 readily be found in the same species. As a general rule, western specimens are paler in color, with 

 the exception of those from Washington Territory, and those from New Mexico and Texas are 

 smaller than Pennsylvania ones. There is, perhaps, a longer, slenderer bill with the smaller 

 size, and the frontal white band is narrower, the black band on the crown broader than in some 

 Wisconsin summer skins, though No. 4329 agrees with them in this respect. The quills and 

 middle tail feathers are lighter brown. They vary among themselves, however, and specimens 

 are occasionally found as large and dark as eastern ones. The skins from California, in reality, 

 are of a darker shade of reddish above than in eastern ones, decidedly more than in the Texan. 



Specimens from Washington Territory differ again from all other western ones in having the 

 feathers of the back conspicuously streaked with dark brown, instead of the usual obsolete tinge 

 of this color. The same difference, however, is seen in eastern specimens, as 7429, from 

 Cleveland. 



Upon the whole, therefore, in the absence of perfect spring specimens of the eastern form, I 

 must confess my inability to give reliable distinctive characters of two or more species, the 

 differences being only such as might be found in a wide range of the same species. The question 

 as to the much more southern breeding range of the bird westward than to the east, may be 

 answered by the suggestion of Dr. Cooper, that they there alone find the peculiar prairies or 

 the desert region which they frequent. 



The difference insisted on by Mr. Audubon, in reference to the tail feathers of two species, 

 has no real existence in nature. 



There is a great diversity of plumage in the western shore larks, varying with the sex, age, 

 and season. 



Without specimens at hand, I am unable to state the difference between the American 

 Eremophila cornuta and the European E. alpestria. 



