LAGOPUS HYPERBOEEUS. 
white, but the last remiges, tertials, and a number of the greater rectrices toAvards the back, are new summer feathers, as shown in the plate. The 
scapi of the remiges are Avhite, AAuth a fuscous or blackish stripe along the middle, but terminating long before the end of the feather is reached. 
The rest of the coloring does not differ from the males from Greenland and Iceland Avith AAhich I haA^e been enabled to compare it. The only 
fault in the figure I haAm mentioned, is, that the lores are not dark enough, which is caused by the fiict that the greater portion of the black 
feathers are out, and the neAA' ones had not been pei’fected. 
“Within afeAv years we have obtained tAvo other specimens; one, a male in jMre winter dress ; A\diite, Avith broad, perfectly black lores; shot 
on north coast of Spitzbergen, 1st of June, 1861, and brought home with Thorell’s expedition. It is in a bad state, but the tail is complete. 
Besides the two white rectrices there are seven black to each side : 150 millimetres long, and the base, for 50 millimetres, white, Avith the shaft as 
in the first specimen, but Avhitish for about 20 millimetres nearer the end of the feather. The remiges, like the former, have a dark middle stripe 
along the shaft. Dimensions a little greater. Total length, moderately stretched, 450 millimetres; Aving, 228; tail, 150. It is thus larger than 
Gould’s female. 
“ Our third specimen, a male, was beginning to moult, — shot the 7th of July, 1864, at Icefjord, and brought home by Malmgren. It is also in 
poor preservation, and is Avhite ; but the head, neck, regis scapularis, have very many neAv summei’ feathers. Tail and remiges exactly like those 
of the two other specimens, but dimensions a little greater. Length of AA'ing, 235 millimetres; tail, about 150; bill and nails, blackish, as in the 
two former. The AAdiite on the base of the tail is concealed by the surrounding feathers in all three specimens. 
“All are in a bad state, as the tAvo latter expeditions could not remain a long time in each place, and the skins dry very sloAvly iu that 
climate. My OAvn specimen would have been better if it had not been moulting, Avith most of its feathers blood feathers. This bird seems 
to be scarce at Spitzbergen, in all three instances. In ours there were no more obtained than the one brought home, and only at Icefjord 
did Malmgren see two more. Mr. Gould’s ornithologist says he found them very plentiful ; but he probably only met one someAvhat large family, 
which he has stoutly destroyed. A great number of travellers, Avho shoot only to kill, or perhaps to eat, contribute very much to perfect 
the work of the ice-foxes at Spitzbergen, and of the common foxes in other places. 
“ In the specimen brought home by me there were only plants in the sesophagus saccus, as leaves and flowers of Saxifragae, etc. Malmgren 
states (in the Ecau of the Acad. Sc., of Stockholm, 1864, p. 379), that he once heard a sound uttered by the male like arrr or errr, in a coarse 
voice, resembling someAA^hat the croaking of a frog. Fabricius also remai’ks this in the Greenland species. 
“ On comparing these birds with the males from Greenland and Iceland, these last are found to be much smaller (Aving 190 and 193 millimetres), 
and the base of the rectrices much less Avhitc, which color does not extend farther on the shaft than on the web ; also, the shafts of the 
remiges are black for their whole breadth. As these differences seem to be constant, they are sufficient to render the Spitzhei’gen bird 
always recognizable from the other tAvo, and thus entitle it to be considered a distinct form, if Ave may not even believe it to be of different 
origin. 
“ I have a female from Greenland, and in this the white basil part of the outer rectrices has really a little difterence in form from the 
males. It is larger on the outer side. From the European Lagopus Mutus they all differ, evidently, the males more, the females from 
Greenland less, in color, but they come very close to it in the form of the bill, black lores, etc.” 
As it seems pretty evudent that the extent of the white on the tail varies considerably in different specimens — a fact Avhich I have 
noticed in a large number of examples of Lagopus Albus^ — the claims of this bird for specific distinction rest upon its large size, which, at 
the best, is a very questionable sufficiency; and it would seem most likely to be the Lagopus Eupestris: but without any number of 
examples to enable me to form my opinion, I have deemed it best to give a figure of the female sent to Mr. Gould, and to hope that 
some no very distant day will afford the material for rightly determining what is uoav so doubtful a point. 
