SUMMER RED BIRD. 
95 
SUMMER RED BIRD TANAGRA iESTIVA. — Plate VI. 
Figs. 3 and 4. 
Tanagra Mississippensis, Lath. Ind. Orn. i. 421, 5. — Mexican Tanager, Lath. Synop. 
iii. 219, 5. b. • — Tanagra variegata, Ind. Orn. i. 421, 6. — Tanagra sestiva, Ind. 
Orn. i. 422, 7 — Muscicapa rubra, Linn. Syst. i. 326, 8 Buff. vi. 252. PI. enl. 
741. — Catesby, Car. i. 56 — Merula flammula, Sandhill Red Bird, Bartram, 299. 
— P sale's Museum, No. 6134. 
PYRANGA JESTIVA. — Y ieillot . 
Subgenus Pyranga, '* Tanagra estiva, Bonap. Synop . p. 105. 
The change of colour which this bird is subject to during 
the first year, and the imperfect figure first given of it by 
Catesby, have deceived the European naturalists so much, that 
four different species have been formed out of this one, as 
appears by the above synonyms, all of which are referable to 
the present species, the Summer Red Bird. As the female 
differs so much in colour from the male, it has been thought 
proper to represent them both ; the female having never, to 
my knowledge, appeared in any former publication ; and all 
the figures of the other that I have seen being little better 
than caricatures, from which a foreigner can form no just 
conception of the original. 
The male of the Summer Red Bird (fig. 3.) is wholly of a 
rich vermilion colour, most brilliant on the lower parts, except 
* Pyranga has been used by Vieillot to designate a group among the 
Tanagers, having the bill of considerable strength, and furnished on the upper 
mandible with an obtuse tooth, — a structure which has been taken by Desmarest 
to denote his Tanagras Coluriens, or Shrike-like Tanagers. They are also the 
Tanagras Cardinal of Cuvier. Bonaparte, again, retains Vieillot’s group, but 
only as a subgenus to Tanagra. 
It is composed of nine or ten species, three only being found in North 
America. They are generally of rich, sometimes gaudy, plumage, and require 
more than one year to arrive at maturity. They live in pairs, and feed on 
insects, berries, or soft seeds. — Ed. 
