436 



SYSTEM A TIG SYNOPSIS. — PA SSEBES — CLAM A TOMES. 



dnerescens. The general body-coloration is almost exactly as in cmerescens, from which it is 

 at once distinguished by the different shape of the bill and diflferent pattern of the tail-feathers. 

 Agreeing very closely in colors with cooperi, it is smaller than that species, and lacks in par- 

 ticular the enormous development of the biU, which, in cooperi, is an inch or more in length of 

 culmen, and proportionately broad. It is clearly neither crinitus proper, nor erinitus cooperi, nor 

 yet cmerescens. Average length 8.75; extent about 12.75; wing 3.60-4.00; tail 3.75; bill 

 0.75 ; tarsus 0.85 ; middle toe and claw 0.75. Lower Eio Grande of Texas, and southward. 

 Common, breeding. Nest and eggs like those of crinitus. (M. crinitus var. irritabilis, Coues, 

 Pr. Phila. Acad., 1872, p. 65, nee Tyrannus irritabilis VieUl. M. crinitus erythroeercus, Coues, 

 Bull. U. S. Geol. Surv., iv, 1878, p. 33, and v, 1879, p. 402'. M. meoaicanus var. cooperi, 

 Ridg., Pr. Nat. Mus., i, p. 138, nee cooperi Bd. M. mexiccmus, Eidg., Pr. Nat. Mus., ii, 

 p. 14.) 



375. M. cineres'cens. (Lat. dnerescens, aghy. Pig. 285.) Ash-theoated Crested Fly- 

 catcher. ^ 9 , adult : Rather olivaceous-brown above, quite brown on the head ; throat 



very pale ash, sometimes almost whitish, changing 

 gradually to very pale yellow or yellowish-white on 

 the rest of the under parts. Primaries edged as in 

 crinitus, but secondaries and coverts edged with gray- 

 ish-white. Tail-feathers as in crinitus, but the rufous 

 of the inner webs hardly or not reaching their ends, 

 being cut off from the tip by widening of the fuscous 

 stripe (in young birds, in which the quills and tail- 

 feathers are more extensively rufous-edged, the last dis- 

 tinction does not hold). Size of erinitus, but tarsi 

 longer and bill slenderer; tarsi 0.80-0.90; biU 0.75- 

 0.85, but only 0.27-0.33 broad at the base, where only 

 about as wide as high, and obviously narrower than in 

 crinitus; though in Cape St. Lucas specimens (M. 

 pertinax Bd.) shaped quite as in crinitus, but smaller. 

 Southwestern U. S. ; N. to Wyoming and Utah and 

 Nevada ; S. through Mexico ; E. and W. from Texas 



to the Pacific ; said to winter in the Lower Colorado valley, U. S. Though so similar to the 



foregoing, it is a difierent bird from any of them. Nesting and eggs as in the others. {M. 



mexiccmus Bd., 1858, nee Kaup, 1851. Tyrawnula mierascens, Lawr., 1851. M. dnerescens 



Coues, 1872.) 



376. M. lawren'cu. (To Geo. N. Lawrence.) Lavstrbnce's Crested Flycatcher. Similar in 

 color to M. crinitus, but mu^h smaller. No chestnut on tail-feathers except a narrow border- 

 ing on the outer webs, and, in the young, an inner margining also. Wing-coverts and inner 

 secondaries as well as the primaries edged with rufous (rarely yellowish on inner secondaries) ; 

 pileum dark or quite blackish. BUI broad, flat, shaped much as in Contopus, about i its own 

 length wide at the nostrils. Very small : length 7.00 or less ; wing and tail only 3.00-3.33 ; 

 bill 0.62-0.70; tarsus 0.65-0.75. Texas (?), Mexico, and Central Am., there running into 

 M. nigricapillus. 



121. SAYIORTVIS. (Name of Thos. Say, with Gr. opvis, amis, a bird.) Pewit Flycatchers. 

 The 3 following species do not particularly resemble each other ; most authors place them in 

 separate genera, and some even under different subfamilies, of Tyrawnidce. The discrepancies 

 of form, however, are not startling, and for the purposes of this work the species may be properly 

 put together, as they agree in presenting a certain aspect not shown by the other N. Am. 

 groups. (Fig. 280, 6.) They are small species, about 7-00 or less in length. Head with a 

 slight crest of erectile feathers. Tarsus rather longer than middle toe and claw (the reverse 



Fio. 286. — AsU-tlii'oated Flycatcher, 

 reduced. (Sheppard del. Nichols so.) 



