ROCK SPARROW. Lvl 



the extremity of each inner web; under tail coverts fawn-colour, 

 with a round patch of white at the extremity of each feather. 

 In the adult there is a band of yellow across the neck anteriorly. 

 Length six inches; carpus to tip four inches; tail two inches 

 and a half; tarsus nine lines; beak eight lines long, and one 

 inch and a fifth in circumference at its base. 



The genus Passer is well marked, and has been 

 established ever since ornithology was a science. Notices 

 of it may be found in the writings of Gesner, Wil- 

 loughby, Aldrovandus, and Ray, and it was finally 

 determined by Brisson, in his "Ornithologia," published 

 in 1760. Cuvier suggested the name of Pyrgyta in- 

 stead, and in some few works he has been followed, 

 very much against the true interests of science. 

 Bonaparte, following Schlegel and others, adopts 

 Brisson's genus with some restrictions, and with his 

 usual fondness for converting specific into generic 

 names, he has followed Kaup by placing the subject 

 of the present notice in a separate genus under the 

 name of Petronia rupestris. 



The Rock Sparrow is an inhabitant of the warm 

 and temperate regions of Europe, namely, Spain, the 

 south of France, Sardinia, and the Avhole of Italy. In 

 the south of France it is very common in Anjou, the 

 Pyrenees, and the Basses Alps. It is found occasionally 

 in Lorraine, and several individuals are stated by 

 Degland to have been captured in the neighbourhood 

 of Paris, and one female at Lille, in October, 1839. 

 It is rare in the north of France and Switzerland, 

 and is only occasionally found solitary in the west and 

 south of Germany, viz., the Rhinegau, Wether au, and 

 several other places on the Rhine. Naumann says it 

 has been shot in Thuringia, but not, to his knowledge 



