Coues’s History of the Evening Grosbeak . 67 
Once seen, the Evening Grosbeak will not likely be forgotten, 
even though we only glance at what was once a brilliant denizen of 
the maple groves, and is now but a bunch of feathers stuffed with 
tow; for there is no bird of our country that in the least resembles 
this striking likeness of a sunset. They say he has a near relative 
in the land of Montezuma,* but he is otherwise quite an isolated 
magnificence, his closest kinship being with the Hawfinch of Europe 
[Coccothraustes vulgaris), whom he resembles in his stature and pro- 
portions, though not at all in coloration. Nor has he the curious 
construction of the wing-feathers that the typical Hawfinch displays, 
these quills being as simple in form as they are in any other mem- 
ber of the extensive family of the Finches. No very distant relatives 
among our Fringillidce are such species as the Blue, the Cardinal, 
the Bose-breasted, and other Grosbeaks, as well as those, like the 
Pine, with which we have grown accustomed to see him associated 
in our books and catalogues. 
He is rather a late aspirant to the questionable honors of our 
literature, having remained unknowm to fame all through the Wil- 
sonian period, and until brought to our notice by Mr. William 
Cooper, whose letter of introduction, originally published in the 
“ Annals of the New York Lyceum of Natural History,” w r as soon ex- 
tensively copied by the editors of other periodicals.^ The bird thus 
* Hesperiphona abeillii (Less.) Bp. 
Gairaca abeillii , Less., “Rev. Zool. 1839, 41 (Mexico).” 
Hesperiphona abeillii, Bp., C. A. I, 1850, 505. — Sumich., Mem. Bost. Soc. 
I, Pt. IY, 1869, 550. — B. B. & R., Hist. N. A. B., I, 1874, 449. 
Coccothraustes abeillii , Scl. & Salv., Ibis, I, 1859, 19. — Scl., P. Z. S. 
1859, 365. —Scl., Cat. A. B., 1862, 123. 
Hesperiphona vespertina, Jun. ex Mex., Bp., C. A. I, 1850, 505. 
Coccothraustes maculipennis, Sol., P. Z. S. 1860, 251, pi. 163 (Vera Cruz). — 
Scl. & Salv., P. Z. S. 1860, 398. 
+ Special papers on Hesperiphona vespertina : — 
1825. Cooper, W. Description of a New Species of Grosbeak [ Fringilla 
vespertina, p. 220], inhabiting the Northwestern Territory of the United States. 
Ann. Lyc. Nat. Hist., New York, I, Pt. II, 1825, pp. 219-222. (Read Janu- 
ary 10, 1825.) 
This is the original description of the species, from the Schoolcraft specimen, 
Saute Ste. Marie, Michigan, April, 1823. 
1826. Cooper, W. Description of a New Species of Grosbeak [ Fringilla 
vespertina, p. 136], inhabiting the Northwestern Territory of the United States. 
Thomson’s Ann. of Philos, (new series), XI, 1826, pp. 134-136. 
Reproduced from Ann. Lyc. Nat. Hist. New York, I, 1825, pp. 219-222. 
1826. Less[on, R. P.]. Description d’une espece nouvelle de Gros-bec 
