
330 EVENING GROSBEAK. 
things as we found them, until we can apply ourselves to the 
work of a general reform, as announced in a previous article 
of this work. ‘Though we regard the grosbeaks as a subgenus, 
others, going to the opposite extreme, have erected them into 
a separate family, composed of several genera. ‘The evening 
erosbeak is, however, so precisely similar in form to the haw- 
finch-type of the group, as to defy the attempts of the most 
determined innovators to separate them. Its bill is as broad, 
as high, quite as strong and turgid, with both mandibles equal, 
the upper depressed and rounded above, and the commissure 
straight, It conforms even, in a slight degree, in the rhom- 
boidal shape of the ends of the secondaries—a character so 
conspicuous in its analogue, to which, in the distribution and 
transitions of its tints, though very different, it also bears a 
resemblance. It is, however, of the four North American 
species of its group, the only one so strictly allied, for even 
the cardinal grosbeak, the most nearly related of these species, 
on account of its short, rounded wings and other minor traits, 
might be separated, though fortunately it has not as yet, to 
our knowledge ; the others have been already. 
The evening grosbeak is eight and a half inches long; its 
bill is of a greenish yellow, brighter on the margins, seven- 
eighths of an inch long, five-eighths broad, the same in height ; 
the capistrum and lora are black; the front is widely bright 
yellow, prolonged in a broad stripe over the eye to the ears ; 
the hind crown is black, intermixed with yellow, visible only 
on separating the feathers, but leading to the suspicion that 
at some period the yellow extends perhaps all over the crown ; 
the sides and inferior parts of the head, the whole neck, above 
and beneath, together with the interscapulars and breast, are 
of a dark olive brown, becoming lighter by degrees; the sca- 
pulars are yellow, slightly tinged with greenish ; the back, 
rump, with the whole lateral and inferior surface, including 
the under wing and under tail coverts, yellow, purer on the 
rump, and somewhat tinged with olive brown on the belly. 
Although these colours are all very pure, they are not definitely 


