70 



SHARP-TAILED FINCH. 

 FRINGILLA CAUDACUTA. 

 [Plate XXXIV.— Fig. 3.] 



Pe ale's Museum^ No. 6442. 



A BIRD of this denomination is described by Turton, Syst. 

 p. 562; but which by no means agrees with the present. This, 

 however, may be the fault of the describer, as it is said to be a bird 

 of Georgia; unwilling, therefore, to multiply names unnecessarily, 

 I have adopted his appellation. In some future part of the work 

 I shall settle this matter with more precision. 



Tliis new (as I apprehend it) and beautiful species is an asso- 

 ciate of the former, inhabits the same places, lives on the same 

 food ; and resembles it so much in manners, that but for their dis- 

 similarity in some essential particulars, I would be disposed to con- 

 sider them as the same in a different state of plumage. They are 

 much less numerous than the preceding, and do not run with equal 

 celerity. 



The Sharp-tailed Finch is five inches and a quarter long, and 

 seven inches and a quarter in extent; bill dusky; auriculars ash; 

 from the bill over the eye and also below it run two broad stripes 

 of brownish orange ; chin whitish ; breast pale buff, marked w ith 

 small pointed spots of black; belly white; vent reddish buff; from 

 the base of the upper mandible a broad stripe of pale ash runs 

 along the crown and hind head, bordered on each side by one of 

 blackish brown ; back a yellowish brown olive, some of the fea- 

 thers curiously edged with semicircles of white; sides under the 

 wings buff, spotted with black; wing coverts and tertials black, 

 broadly edged with light reddish buff ; tail cuneiform, short ; all the 



