Page:Condor4(2).djvu/8

 3 6 THE CONDOR I Vol. IV' 'bust child decided to leave. As it spread its wings to fly away the weak- ling brother felt to the ground. Kind hands rescued it, the torn nest was care- fully drawn together and it placed within, for we supposed, of course, the mother would come to feed it, but .she did not. All day it lay without food. That night a rain came, and ,the next day it seemed chilled and almost life- less. Flowers were placed near it that it might find food within--if it would. Another cold night passed, and we thought the life of the little one would be ended, but when the warm sun came it raised itself, stretched first one wing then the other, and with a last look at its human friends darted away to be lost in bird-land. The Oregon Song Sparrow. v W,LTEt K. wsut. M R. Joseph Grinnell has generously placed at my disposal a eries of four-' teen curious dark song sparrows collected by Mr. Edmund Heller at Cres- cent City, California, and along the coast of southern Oregon. A com- parison of the series with some excellent unworn examples of the Mendocino, rusty, and sooty song sparrows in the National Museum and Biological Survey collections proves that the form is undeseribed, as Mr. Grinnell thought when he forwarded me the specimens. Melospiza cinerea phma new subspecies. OREGON SONG SPARROW. Type, CS ad., No. 4974, (2oil. Joseph Grinnell; Gardiner, month of Umpqua R., Oregon, Dec. I, I9ot; collected by Edmund Heller. Subspecific characters.--Intermediate in size between ]ff;elospiza cinerea cleonensis and . c. morphna but darker than either; in general color and markings nearly identical with ]ff;elospiza cinerea rufina, but much smaller. Measurements of type in millimeters: wing, 68; tail, 65; exposed culmeu, xx; depth of bill at base 6.5; tarsus Distritrution.--Immediate vicinity of coast from Rogue R. to Yaquina, Oregon. Measurements of type series compared with Arelospiza cinerea rufina, ]ff;. c. morphna, and 3r. c. cleoncrisis. Wing. Tail. Culmen. Crescent City CS Sept. I5 6I. 58. o.5 " CS " 62. 60. xo.5 " CS ad " 62.5 6t.5 to.75 Goldbeach, Or. CS ad Oct. to 64. 65. " CS " 61. 6t. it. Gardiner, Or. CS ad Dec.  65. 6o. " CS ad " 65. 60. " CS ad " 68. 65. " CS " 65. 65. " CS " 67. 65 . Yaquina, Or. CS Oct. 3 t, '94 62. 62. Average x CS CS 64. 62.4 Goldbeach $ Oct. to 65. 63. "  " 63. 60. Gardiner  Dec. x 6t. 6t. "  " 63. 60. Average, 4 $ $ 63. 61. rufina: average, 5 CS CS 72.x 7o.x 12.4 .... t3 '$ $ 67. 63.5 I2.2 morphna: " 20 CS CS 67.8 66. t2.9 .... I3 ?  65. 63. t2.4 cleonensis " t3 CS CS 6t-7 59-9 11.9 .... 9 9 9 59.4 58. t tt. 9 (Rid ,g, way)