Page:Notes on the Ornithology of Southern Texas.djvu/53

168 more purplish on the back, rump, and upper tail-coverts, and of a rich dark purplish maroon shade on the breast and sides; anal region, tibiae, and crissum duller and more grayish. Eemiges (except the tertials) pale yellowish pea-green, bordered terminally with dull dusky, this border very narrow, and strictly terminal on the secondaries, but broader and involving more or less of both edges of the quills on the primaries, where it increases in extent to the outer quill, which has the entire outer web blackish ; alulae and primary coverts dull blackish. Tail-feathers uni- form rich chestnut. u Iris dark brown ; bill, alar spurs, and frontal leaf, bright yellow ; upper base of bill bluish white, the space between it and the nasal leaf bright carmine; feet greenish" (Sumichrast, MS., fide Lawr., Bull. TJ. S. Nat. Mus. No. 4, 1876, p. 50).

Young : Frontal leaf rudimentary. Pileum grayish-brown, bordered on each side by a wide and conspicuous superciliary stripe of buffy white, extending to the occiput ; below this stripe, another narrower one of black or dusky, beginning at the posterior angle of the eye and extending along the upper edge of the auriculars to the nape, which is also of this color ; remainder of the head, with the entire lower parts, except the sides, continuous buffy white, more strongly tinged with buff across the jugulum. Upper parts in general (except the remiges) light grayish-brown, the feathers bordered terminally with rusty buff in the younger stage, but uniform in older individuals; rump more or less tinged with chestnut. Sides and lining of the wing dusky black, but in older examples more or less tinged with chestnut. Remiges as in the adult; rectrices grayish-brown.

The downy youDg is unknown, or at least if described I have been unable to find out where.

In the considerable series of specimens of this species contained in the collection of the National Museum, notable variations in size and proportions occur among specimens of the same age and sex, but apparently without regard to locality. Cuban specimens do not differ in the least from Mexican and Central American examples.

The following note was published in the Bulletin of the Nuttall Orni- thological Club, vol. i, p. 88. I have nothing to add to it, except that during a recent visit to Washington Mr. Ridgway showed me some skins of this curious bird, and I was enabled to positively identify them with the birds I saw: — ;< Early in August (1876) I saw a pair of water- birds quite new to me on the borders of a lagoon near Fort Brown. I was on horseback at the time, and did not have my gun, but had a good opportunity to observe them carefully. The next day I winged one of them, but it fell into a dense bed of water-plants, and could not be found, and the survivor disappeared. Respecting a letter describ- ing the bird as seen, Mr. Ridgway writes : 'The bird you describe is un- doubtedly Parra gymnosioma ; * * * the chestnut back and yellow (greenish-yellow) wings settle the species beyond a doubt.' 7?