346 BULLETIN 50, UKITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



{Nesopsar'] nigerrimus Sclatbr and Salvin, Nom. Av. Neotr., 1873, 38. — Coey, 



List Birds W. I., 1885, 14. 

 Nlesopsar] nigerrimus 'N'ewton (E. and A.), Handb. Jamaica, 1881, 103. 

 Agdaius nigerrimus Oassin, Proc. Ac. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1866, 12 (monogr.). — 



Pelzeln, Ibis, 1873, 28. 

 Ageisms nigerrimus Sclatee, Ibis, 1884, 14 (monogr.). 



Genus XANTHOCEPHALUS Bonaparte. 



Xanthocephalus Bonaparte, Consp. Av., i, June 15, 1850, 431. (Type, Ictems 

 icierocephalus Bonaparte, = I. xanthocephalus Bonaparte. ) 



Medium-sized terrestrial and paludicoline Icteridae, with bill decid- 

 edly shorter than head; wing long and pointed (nearly seven times 

 as long as culmen, the ninth or eighth primary longest); tarsus nearly 

 one-fourth as long as wing; middle toe with claw nearly as long as 

 tarsus, the lateral toes with their claws reaching beyond base of 

 middle claw, the claws long and not strongly curved; color black or 

 diisky, with more or less of yellow on chest (adult male with head and 

 neck yellow also and with a white patch on wing). 



Bill decidedly shorter than head, stout-conical, compressed, with 

 nearly straight outlines, its basal depth about equal to distance from 

 nasal fossae to tip of maxilla, its basal width much less; culmen 

 straight, ilattened, the basal end elevated and slightly arched; gonys 

 straight or very slightly convex, slightly shorter than maxilla from 

 nostril; commissure nearly straight to behind nostril, where strongly 

 deflexed to the rictus. Nostril pyriform-oval (obtusely pointed ante- 

 riorly), overhung by a very broad and prominent horny operculum, its 

 posterior end in contact with the feathering of the frontal antise. Wing 

 long (nearly seven times as long as culmen), long-tipped (primaries 

 exceeding secondaries by about twice the length of the culmen), pointed; 

 outermost (ninth) primary usually longest, the eighth and seventh, 

 successively, but little shorter, the former sometimes equal to the 

 ninth, rarely a little longer; inner webs of four outer primaries slightly 

 sinuated near tips. Tail more than two-thirds as long as wing, slightly 

 rounded or double-rounded, the rectrices rather hard and stiflf; outer 

 web of lateral rectrix very narrow in middle portion, widening subter- 

 minally. Tarsus more than twice as long as bill from nostril, nearly 

 one-fourth as long as wing, rather slender, its anterior scutella distinct; 

 middle toe, with claw, nearly as long as tarsus; outer toe with claw 

 reaching beyond base of middle claw, the inner longer, with its claw 

 reaching to middle of middle claw; hallux nearly as long as outer toe, 

 decidedly stouter, its claw nearly as long as the digit, rather slender, 

 and not strongly curved; anterior claws not strongly curved. 



Coloration. — Adult male black with head, neck, and chest yellow, 

 the wing with a white patch; adult fernale and young dusky with 

 under parts more or less streaked, the chest with more or less yellow. 



Range. — Western and central temperate North America. (Mono- 

 typic.) 



