956 Synopsis of Indian Fringillidce. [[No. 156. 



Chrysomitris, Boie. The Siskins. The only Himalayan Siskin I 

 know, like the Goldfinch last described, is remarkable for its thickened 

 beak, approximating it to Ligurinus, Brisson, or the Greenfinches ; one 

 species of which, inhabiting the western coast of S. America, the L. 

 xanthogrammica, G. R. Gray, presents a close approach on the part of 

 the Greenfinches to the Goldfinches, the Siskins, and also to the Lin- 

 nets, the form of its beak scarcely differing from that of the Himalayan 

 Siskin, or 



Chr. spinoides; Carduelis spinoides, Vigors, P. Z. S. 1831, p. 44; 

 Gould's ' Century,' pi. XXXIII, fig. 2. 



With the Siskins I terminate the series of Indian true Finches; and 

 next in succession would come the Greenfinches, which would bring 

 us back to the Grosbeaks with which we commenced ; but this circle 

 might be formed quite as ^satisfactorily in various other ways, the 

 transitional forms of the present series being so numerous and com- 

 pletely intermediate, that all minute classification of them must be, in 

 various instances, more or less arbitrary. By way of assistance to the 

 student, I annex a plate with representations of the beaks of most of 

 the species here comprised : but it must be remembered that it is not 

 the beak alone, but the ensemble, which is our guide in the systematic 

 arrangement of the Fringillidae. In various most natural minor groups 

 of this family, the same variety of modifications of the bill present 

 themselves again and again, even to the Bullfinch, Grosbeak, and Gold- 

 finch, extremes of form ; as is especially well exemplified by the very 

 peculiar group of short- tailed Finches so extensively developed in the 

 Gallapagos islands ; and in the instance of the common northern Snow- 

 fleck (Plectrophanes nivalis) and the Alpine Snowfinch (Montifringilla 

 nivalis), we find the closest approximation in general characters com- 

 bined with a very striking diversity in the conformation of the beak, 

 which in the one case is that of a Bunting, and in the other that of a 

 restricted Fringilla ; the affinity of the birds themselves being further 

 manifested even by the seasonal changes of colour which take place in 

 the beak, however dissimilar its form, for in both of these birds it turns 

 quite black at the breeding season.* Were we to follow the indications 



* Mr. Strickland, in his recent letter to me before referred to, alludes to "the 

 many cases among the Fringillidce, in which the form of beak must give way to the 

 preponderance of other characters, and especially to the style of colours in the plu- 





