The MontJis Arrivals. 
117 
call-notes and song, and I have had a male F. denlala for four years 
which has quite lost the yellow spot. Of this last consignment one 
individual had just one yellow feather in the throat, the rest of which was 
white. I think I have probably liad more representatives of this species 
than any aviculturist as I have always boiij^hl all those I came across. 
Collecting Rock-vSparrows is, hovvevei', not an expensive hobby, the price 
ranging between one and two shillings. The)' are dangerous in an aviary 
and have nothing whatever to recommend them except the iuteiest attach- 
ing to them from an ornithological point of view. W.E.T. 
Mr. F. C. Thorpe has sent me a sketch and particulars, by request, of 
a pair of Central American Finches which he has just imported. He de.s- 
cribes them as being of the size of a common Sparrow and resembling the 
latter on crown, back and tail markings, though more grey; eyebrows and 
upper breast yellow; upper throat white; between throat and breast a 
black bib. I liave verj' little doubt but that this is the Black-throated 
Bunting (Spiza americana), an inhabitant of the United States, but winter- 
ing in Mexico and Central .America. It nests on the ground, and its song 
is said to resemble the Yellow Hammer's. Although it has been seen once 
at all events at our Zoological Gardens, this is distinctly a rarely imported 
bird, and, if Mr. Thoipe has a true pair, he is to be congratulated. 
W.E.T. 
Reference was made some time since in these notes to the sexual 
distinctions of the Green Jay (Xanlhura luxiiosa). vSo far from having 
reached a solution of the matter, the problem seems to me to become more 
and more difficult. I have now come across four types or phases of plumage, 
not counting the form with deep rufous breast wliich I take to be another 
species. iMrst there is the type with the broad white frontal band, declared 
by a well known dealer to be dislinclive of the male. Secondly the type 
with narrow frontal band, pror.ounced by the same importer to be a female. 
Thirdly tlie small specimen I recently described which has a bright green 
back wiil'.out a trace of blue, and with a different call-note. 
This bird, which I conjectured to be a female, is now in my outdoor 
aviary wilh two others but has so far given no indication of sex whatever. 
The other day another dealer proudly informed me that he had at last 
obtained two undoubted hens, and to my great surprise I was introduced to 
yet another distinct type. These two birds looked .so-very distinct that at 
first I thought they must belong to another species, but, on closer examina- 
tion, I could only come to the conclusion that thev were immature X. 
/uxiiosa. The)' were distinctly smaller, light chrome on the breast, instead 
of orange, and the tuft of feathers surrounding the nostrils was quite 
absent. They were imported with five of the ordinary type. W.E.T. 
I have recently obtained from Austria a pair of Alpine Accentors 
(.-/arw/OA rt//>/«?«) and Snow Finches (Fringitla nivalis), and have been ex- 
ceedingly interested in noting their habits in an outdoor aviary— in fact. 
