Hensiiaw on Melosjpiza meloda and its Allies. 159 
occur farther to the north. Thus, fall and winter specimens from 
Nicasio, migrants from more northern localities, are noticeably inter- 
mediate in colors between scimuelis and guttata ; while during the 
past season I obtained specimens in Oregon, at the base of the 
eastern slope of the Cascades, — thus approximating the habitat 
of fallax, — that hold a similar relation to that central region form, 
the two races to the northward evidently passing by insensible 
stages into guttata. 
Yar. rufina is simply guttata , with its peculiarities carried a step 
or two farther, corresponding with increased latitude. The rufous 
of guttata becomes in typical rufina a reddish sepia-brown ; the size 
is somewhat larger, the bill rather more slender. Such is rufina 
as found about Sitka and to an uncertain distance southward. 
Upon certain, perhaps all, of the Alaskan islands occurs insignis. 
This gigantic Sparrow is distinguished, in addition to its great size, 
by a much paler, grayer phase of color than its nearest geographical 
neighbor, rufina. The streaks, instead of being nearly or quite 
obsolete as in that form, are well defined and Of an umber-brown. 
Of insignis, Baird and Ridgway say : “ Between M. melodia. of the 
Atlantic States and M. insignis of Kodiak the difference seems wide, 
but the connecting links in the inter-regions bridge this over so com- 
pletely that, with a series of hundreds of specimens before us, 
we abandon the attempt at specific separation.” It ueeds but a 
glance to determine that the var. rufina is nearer insignis by many 
degrees than the meloda of the East, and, as has been indicated, 
nothing is wanting in the chain of evidence to establish the connec- 
tion between rufina and meloda. But while admitting the possi- 
bility, perhaps even probability, that the relations between insignis 
and rufina may be as close as that of races, we -feel justified in as- 
serting that the intergradation necessary to establish this cannot be 
shown from the material acccumulated up to the present time. 
Measurements appended below demonstrate that between the largest 
specimen of rufina in the collection and the smallest insignis there 
is a by no means inconsiderable gap. Nor does there appear to be 
any known law of geographical variation by which this discrepancy 
of size can be accounted for. 
The law of increase of size with increased latitude, while applying 
to the preceding members of this group, fails of application in the 
case of insignis ; since Sitka, the metropolis of rufina , is in the same 
latitude with Kodiak, that of insignis ; while one specimen of rufina, 
