The Dawson Leuco 



Authorities. — Cooper, J. G., Ornith. Calif., 1870, p. 164, fig.; Fisher, A. K., 

 N. Amer. Fauna, no. 7, 1893, pp. 82-83 (distr. ; habits); Daggett, Bull. Cooper Orn. 

 Club, vol. i., 1899, p. 119; Dean, Condor, vol. vii., 1905, p. 112 (food); Ray, Condor, 

 vol. xii., 1910, pp. 147-161, figs. 43-54 (discovery of nest and eggs) ; Grinnell, Condor, 

 vol. xv., 1913, pp. 76-78 (desc. of dawsoni); Dawson, Condor, vol. xvi., 1914, p. 41 

 (nest). 



IN ONE SENSE at least the American Leucostictes stand at the very 

 apex of evolutionary progress. If life began, as the biologists assert, in 

 the depths of the ocean, then it is the "Leuco" who has carried life's ban- 

 ner highest. Today he flaunts it from the mountain peaks, from Shasta and 

 Whitney no less than from Blanca and Baker and Robson. If lofty asso- 

 ciation means anything for character, also, the Sierra Nevada Rosy Finch 

 ought to be the very best of birds, for it is his privilege to spend a lifetime 

 wrestling with the eternal snows. Be that as it may — and we, perhaps, 

 are not able to set up the standards of bird ethics — there can be no doubt 

 that this exalted breed of birds constitutes one of the most fascinating 

 subjects for study which western bird-life offers. And because its ways 

 of life have been so long remote from ordinary observation, the Leuco- 

 sticte has been invested with something of the same sanctity which, 

 in the thought of Nature's purest worshippers, clings about the vestal 

 mountains. It seems a sort of sacrilege to bring them down, these 

 vestal mountaineers, to ply them with questions of food and raiment 

 and manner of life. The author knows something of these things, per- 

 haps as much as any one, but instead of telling about them he would 

 rather sing a paean and draw the curtain of respect. It is one thing 

 to know the Eleusinian mysteries, but quite another to proclaim them 

 from the house-top. Your pardon, gentle Leucos! 



A technical description of the Leucosticte's wardrobe may be found 

 in any manual, and we pause here only to note that the rosy fringes and 

 flushes which decorate its sober browns are a common adornment in the 

 family Fringillidce. There are, it may be, a hundred species of "rosy 

 finches" at the very least, so that the attempted monopoly of the name 

 "Rosy Finch" for our American Mountaineers is absurd and futile. 

 No more fortunate is the name "Leucosticte," meaning "varied by 

 white." The whitish edgings on this bird are few and obscure and in 

 no wise distinctive. The name "Leucosticte" is a jaw-breaker, and 

 the public will not stand for it. We are in a box. But since we are 

 in it, let's make the best of it, and abbreviate our angel's name to Leuco. 

 Never mind what it means; nobody pays any attention to Greek nowa- 

 days. It sounds distinctive, not to say expensive, and a wee bit endearing. 

 Shall it be "Leuco," then? 



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