MEALY REDPOLL LINNET. 
121 
I and my party had procured a good number of Common Redpolls in the 
rugged country of Labrador, but not a single bird of this species ; which yet 
removes during winter to our middle districts. A specimen in my posses- 
sion was procured near Moorestown, in the State of New Jersey, by my 
valued friend Edward Harris, Esq., and I have seen several others that 
were obtained near Baltimore in Maryland. 
That the Mealy Redpoll becomes a richly coloured bird at the approach 
of the breeding season I feel quite confident, and I will now venture to give 
you some idea of its appearance at that happy period of its life. Then, I 
would say, the cheeks and the whole under *part of the body, excepting a 
large black patch on the throat, are of a rich carmine, as is the rump. The 
spots seen on the sides of the breast, and along the lower parts of the body, 
almost to the femorals, disappear, and the upper parts, or the shoulders and 
back, become almost of a uniform rich brown, as those parts are in the 
Common Linnet of Europe. 
The present species is rather larger than the Common Redpoll. The 
colour of its bill even during winter differs in being of a rich yellow, and 
its legs, feet, and claws at that season are pure black, instead of reddish- 
brown. 
On two occasions I have seen the Mealy Redpoll associated with the 
American Siskin, in the beginning of October, in the province of New 
Brunswick. They were then feeding on the seeds of neglected sun-flowers. 
Accidental in New Jersey and New York. More common from Maine 
northward. Labrador and Fur Countries. Columbia river. 
Grosbec boreal, Fringilla borealis , Tennn. Man. d’Orn., vol. iii. p. 264. 
Mealy Redpoll, Fringiila borealis , Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. v. p. 8*7. 
Adult Male. 
Bill short, strong, conical, much compressed toward the end, extremely 
acute ; upper mandible with the dorsal line straight, the ridge narrow, the 
sides convex, the edges sharp and overlapping, without notch, the tip acumi- 
nate ; lower mandible with the angle short and semicircular, the dorsal line 
straight, the ridge narrow, the sides convex, the edges sharp and inflected, 
the tip very acute. Nostrils basal, roundish, covered by stiffish reversed 
feathers. 
Head of moderate size, roundish ; neck short ; body moderate. Feet of 
moderate length, rather slender ; tarsus short, compressed, anteriorly covered^ 
with a few scutella, of which the upper are blended, posteriorly with two 
longitudinal plates meeting at a very acute angle ; toes rather stout, the first 
