56 Brewster’s Descriptions of the First Plumage 
stance of the capture of the Western form in New England. As 
a pretty conclusive proof that our New York bird has been derived 
from the Western ( excubitoroides ) “type,” we have the fact of the 
continuity of its range eastward from the Mississippi to the Adiron- 
dacks (through Ohio to Buffalo, Auburn, Utica, and Lewis County, 
New York) ; while, on the other hand, its entire absence from those 
portions of the State where the Carolinian Fauna is most marked 
(notably along the Hudson River, where such characteristic birds as 
Ideria virens , Myiodioctes mitratus, Helmitherus vermivorus, and 
Siurus motacilla breed in abundance) is sufficient evidence that it 
is not the Southern bird. That it does not occur in the region 
above specified is pretty clearly shown by the fact that neither Ed- 
gar A. Mearns (of Highland Falls, near West Point) nor Eugene P. 
Bicknell (of Riverdale), two of our most enterprising young collec- 
tors, have ever met with even a single straggler of the genus, other 
than C. borealis, although they have both made the birds of the 
Hudson River Valley a special study. 
{To be continued .) 
DESCRIPTIONS OF THE FIRST PLUMAGE IN VARIOUS 
SPECIES OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 
BY WILLIAM BREWSTER. 
II* 
24. Helminthophaga chrysoptera. 
Fall plumage : male. Upper parts bluish-gray, washed strongly with 
olive-green on the back. Forehead and crown yellow, somewhat ob- 
scured by greenish streaking. Occiput bright greenish-yellow. Patch on 
wings clear yellow. Band through the eye and entire under parts, as in 
the adult. Chin, throat, and jugulum black, each feather broadly edged 
with soiled white. White maxillary stripes fairly meeting on anterior 
portion of chin. (This last feature may probably be explained by indi- 
vidual variation, not by age. I have seen many adults similarly charac- 
terized.) 
Fall plumage : female. Remiges, rectrices, etc., as in adult. Pileum 
and nape uniform olive-green ; back and rump bluish-gray, washed with 
* For Part I, see this volume, pp. 15- 23. 
