ARKANSAW FLYCATCHER. 
19 
colour, and very slightly emarginated; the exterior feather is white 
on the outer web, the shaft being white on the exterior half, and 
brown on the interior. 
Say first described and named this bird in the second volume of 
the work above quoted; and he remarks that it is allied to tli eTy- 
rannus griseus and Tijrannus sulphuratus of Vieillot. There are 
many species for which the Arkansaw Flycatcher might more rea¬ 
dily be mistaken; of these, we may mention the Crested Flycatcher 
(Muscicapa crinita ), so well described and figured by Wilson in his 
second volume; and particularly the Muscicapa ferox* of Gmelin, 
a South American bird, the description of which agrees so well with 
the species we are now considering, that it might be equally applied 
to either. Our bird differs from the two latter by that striking cha¬ 
racter, the white exterior web of the outer tail feather. From the 
crinita it may, more especially, be known by the spot on the crown, 
which does not exist in that species; by not having the tail and wing 
feathers rufous in any part; and by having the primaries narrowed 
at tip, while the crinita has them quite large, entire, and rounded. 
On a particular comparison with th eferox, we shall perceive that 
the bill of that bird is flattened, broad, and carinate, whilst in the 
rerticalis it is almost rounded above. The general colour of the lat- 
tei is, besides, much paler, and the tail is less deeply emarginated. 
The Arkansaw Flycatcher appears to inhabit all the region ex¬ 
tending west of the Missouri river. The specimen we have been 
desciibing is a male, killed in the beginning of July, on the river 
Platte, a few days march from the mountains. 
* This bird had been incorrectly considered by Vieillot, in his Natural History of 
North American Birds, as identical with the Muscicapa crinita; but, afterwards per¬ 
ceiving it to be a distinct species, he named it Tyrannus ferox. A specimen is in the 
Philadelphia Museum, designated by the fanciful name of Ruby-crowned Flycatcher, 
(with this Say compared his Tyrannus verticalis, before he stated it to be new,) and, 
in the New-York Museum, three specimens are exhibited, with the erroneous title of 
Whiskered Flycatcher (Muscicapa barbata ). 
