48 Holterhoff on Nest, and Eggs of Ee Conte's Thrasher. [January 
It can hardly be doubted that many similar examples of ex- 
treme individual variation remain to be detected Among the 
Terns two cases almost exactly parallel with those I have men- 
tioned have already been brought to light by Air. William 
Brewster,* though in these instances the author’s arguments 
were based wholly upon the evidence offered by plumage, and, 
as a result, a generally accepted species was reduced to the rank 
of a synonym. A state of things no less remarkable is now 
familiar to ornithologists in the frequent melanism, partial or 
entire, seen in several species of Hawks ; in the pure dichroma- 
tism of certain Owls and Herons ; and in the irregularity with 
which the waxy appendages are assumed in the genus Ampelis . 
NEST AND EGGS OF LECONTE’S THRASHER (HAR- 
PORHTNCHUS REDIVIVUS LECONTII). 
BV G. HOLTERHOFF, JR. 
In an article published in the “American Naturalist” for March, 
1881 , I gave a short description of the nest and eggs of Le Conte’s 
Thrasher. As I believe these to be the first eggs known of this 
rare Thrasher, and as yet unique, I will endeavor to give a more 
complete and exact description of the set. The “find” was made 
near a small station on the Southern Pacific Railroad, called Flow- 
ing Wells. This is in the heart of the Colorado Desert, about 
seventy-five miles north of Fort Yuma. The country thereabout 
is a barren, sandy desert, broken by an occasional dry arroyo or 
river bed, scarce worthy of the name, as they are only rivers 
when bearing off the deluge from some fortuitous cloud-burst. 
Scattered sparingly along the course of these fickle streams is a 
stunted growth of mesquite and palo-verde trees, the commonest 
and most typical forms of desert vegetation. It was while wan- 
dering up one of these arroyos, wearied and almost parched by 
the fierce heat, that I caught sight of a dusky-gray bird flitting 
from bush to bush, always in short, jerky flights, and close to the 
ground. Expectation cheered my footsteps. The bird, alighting 
*Some Additional Light on the so-called Sterna Portlandica, Ridgway. Ann. Lyc. 
Nat. Hist., N. Y., Vol. XI, pp. 201-207. 
