126 



LESSER RED-POLL.* 

 FRINGILLA LIN ARIA. 

 [Plate XXX.— Fig. 4.] 



TueTon's Linnceus, T, p. 562 ^Bewick's Bntish Birds, I, j), 191. — Br. Zool. JVo. 132. Jlrct. Zool, 



JVo. 262. — Le Caharef^ Buff. Ois. VII, 109. PI. enl. JVo. 485.— Belon, av. 356 — ^Albin, III, 

 p. 31. — P/i. Trans. Ixii, 405. — Grasiska, Faun. Suec. JVo. 241. 



CONTRARY to the usual practice of Mr. Wilson, he omit- 

 ted to furnish a particular description of this species, accompany- 

 ing its figure in the fourth volume of the present work. But this 

 supplementary notice would not have been considered necessary, 

 if our author had not fallen into a mistake respecting the mark- 

 ings of the female and the young male ; the former of which he 

 describes as destitute of the crimson on the forehead; and the latter 

 not receiving that ornament till the succeeding spring. When Mr. 

 Wilson procured his specimens, it was in the autumn, previously 

 to their receiving their perfect winter dress ; and he was never 

 afterwards aware of his error, owing to the circumstance of these 

 birds seldom appearing in the neighborhood of Philadelphia. Con- 

 siderable flocks of them, however, have visited us this winter; and 

 we have been enabled to procure several fine specimens of both 

 sexes, from the most perfect of which we have taken the following 

 description. We will add, that having had the good fortune to 

 observe a flock, consisting of nearly an hundred, within a few feet 

 of them, as they were busily engaged in picking the seeds of the 

 Wild Orache,t we can with confidence assert that they all had the 

 red patch on the crown ; but there were very few which had the 

 red rump and breast ; the young males, it is probable, are not 



* See vol. iv of this work, p. 42. 



f Atriplex hastata, Linn. 



