62 
BULLETIN OF THE NUTTALL 
Tyrannidce, I find, as before, only one of these little feathers. In 
a Woodpecker, remarkable among picarian birds in possessing only 
nine fully developed primaries, the first being short or spurious, 
there is also but one. 
It seems to be conclusively proven that among the supposed 
9-primaried birds, the additional primary, making ten in all, is usu- 
ally, if not always, found in the second of these little quills which 
overlie the first fully developed primary ; and that it is this same 
little quill which, in 10-primaried Oscines, in Clamatores, and proba- 
bly in other birds, comes to the front and constitutes the first regular 
primary, — sometimes remaining very short, when it is the so-called 
“spurious” quill, in other cases lengthening by imperceptible de- 
grees, until it may become the longest one of all. The true nature 
of the other one of these two little feathers becomes an interest- 
ing question. Is it also an abortive primary, as the outer certainly 
is, or is it one of a series of coverts '? 
After close examination, I fail to detect any material difference in 
the position of the two ; one overlies the other, indeed, as a covert 
should a primary, but then the two are inserted side by side, both 
upon the upper side of the sheath of the first fully developed quill. 
In size and shape, the two are substantially the same ; both being 
rigid and acuminate, more like remiges than like coverts, and both 
being abruptly shorter than the true primary coverts. [ So far, all the 
evidence favors an hypothesis that both are rudimentary remiges. 
To offset this, color usually points the other way, as in the original 
case of Vireo Jiavifrons, in which Professor Baird determined the 
underlying one of the two feathers to be a supposed wanting pri- 
mary mainly because it was colored like the other primaries, while 
the overlying one agreed with the coverts in this respect. But it 
will be obvious that when, as is oftenest the case, the primaries and 
their coverts are colored alike, the evidence from this source fails 
altogether ; and I find that the testimony from coloration is some- 
times the other way. In Sitta carolinensis, for example, a 10-prima- 
ried bird with spurious first primary, the single remaining little 
feather is white at base across both webs, like the primaries, the 
true primary coverts being white only on th6 inner web. It is true 
that the overlying one of these little feathers sometimes exactly 
resembles a true covert ; but so, also, does the other one in some 
cases. In morphological determinations, position and relation of 
parts are all-important, while mere size, shape, and especially func- 
