331 



FAMILY XV.*— FRINGILLIN^. FINCHES. 

 Genus IX.f— FRINGILLA, Linn. FINCH. 



HARRIS' FINCH. 



Fringilla Harrisii, Jiud. 



PLATE CCCCLXXXIV.— Male and Young. 



The discovery of this beautiful bird is due to my excellent and constant 

 friend Edward Harris, Esq., who accompanied me on my late journey to 

 the Upper Missouri river, &c, and after whom I have named it, as a memento 

 of the grateful feelings I will always entertain towards one ever kind and 

 generous to me. 



The first specimen seen, was procured May 4th, 1843, a short distance 

 below the Black Snake Hills. I afterwards had the pleasure of seeing another 

 whilst the steamer Omega was fastened to the shore, and the crew engaged 

 in cutting wood. This was on the west side of the river, at a place lately 

 occupied by Indians engaged in making maple sugar. The country was 

 hilly, the timber large, and the abandoned camp of a party of Indians, 

 proved to us that game was abundant in the neighbourhood, as we saw the 

 remains of Deer, Wild Turkeys and Pigeons strewed around the hut, where 

 the pots and kettles of these sons of the forest had manufactured the sugar. 



As I was on the look-out for novelties, I soon espied one of these Finches, 

 which, starting from the ground only a few feet from me, darted on, and 

 passed through the low tangled brushwood too swiftly for me to shoot on 

 the wing. I saw it alight at a great distance, on the top of a high tree, and 

 my several attempts to approach it, proved ineffectual; it flew from one to 

 another tree top as I advanced, and at last rose in the air and disappeared. 

 During our journey up the stream my friend Harris, however, shot two 

 others, one of which proved a female, and another specimen was procured by 

 Mr. J. G. Bell, who also was one of my party. Upon our return voyage, 

 my friend Harris had the good fortune to shoot a young one, supposed to 



* See vol. iii. p. 49. t Ibid. p. 138. 



