30 MARSH BUNTING. 



thing except the shortness, stoutness, and convexity of 

 the beak, and in the greater distinctness and brilliancy 

 of the colouring. Bonaparte, on the contrary, not only 

 admits the Marsh Bunting as a distinct species, but 

 adds another, which is said to be intermediate in 

 character between this and schcenicuhis, under the name 

 of S. intermedia, the E. intermedia of Michahelles, the 

 E. canneti of Bream; and he places the three in a 

 new genus, that of Schcenicola. Boux also denies that 

 the Marsh can ever be confounded with the Beed 

 Bunting; and Degland adds several points of distinction 

 to those given by Temminck, which I have incorporated 

 after verification in my specific diagnosis. Degland 

 thinks that Temminck did not know the true E. 

 palustris, but that the specimens upon which he as- 

 sumed its identification with E. schceniculus were, in 

 fact, larger specimens of this latter species. In a note 

 which I have just received from Professor Blasius, of 

 Brunswick, that distinguished naturalist places this bird 

 as a variety of E. schceniculus. 



Such being the difference . of opinion about the 

 specific distinctness of this bird, let us hear what 

 Savi himself says about it. I copy the following from 

 his "Ornitologia Toscana," tome secondo, p. 92: — "The 

 Zigolo of which I speak has been for some time in 

 the hands of ornithologists. The Buntinar, of which 

 there is a drawing in the 'Storia degli Uccelli,' under 

 the name of Migliarino di Padule, is clearly recognised 

 by the form of its beak, as belonging to this species. 

 In the Museum of Turin, and in that of the Jar din 

 des Plantes at Paris, it is preserved as a variety of 

 Emberiza schceniculus. Signor Dott: Pajola sent it to 

 me last year from Venice, describing it as a new 

 species. I had long fancied it was distinct, but as 



