breakfast, which all enjoyed. No Wolves had disturbed our slumbers, and we now started in search of quadrupeds, birds, and adventures. We found several plants, all new to me, and which are now in press. All the ravines which we inspected were well covered by cedars of the red variety, and whilst ascending several of the hills we found them in many parts partially gliding down as if by the sudden effects of very heavy rain. We saw two very beautiful Avocets [Recurvirostra amcricana] feeding opposite our camp ; we saw also a Hawk nearly resembling what is called Cooper's Hawk, but having a white rump. Bell joined the hunters and saw some thousands of Buffalo; and finding a very large bull within some thirty yards of them, they put in his body three large balls. The poor beast went off, however, and is now, in all probability, dead. Many fossil remains have been found on the hills about us, but we saw none. These hills are composed of limestone rocks, covered with much shale. Harris thinks this is a different formation from that of either St. Louis or Belle Vue — but, alas! we are not much of geologists. We shot only one of Say's Flycatcher, and the Finch we have called Emberiza pallida[1] but of which I am by no means certain, for want of more exact descriptions than those of a mere synopsis. Our boat made its
- ↑ Audubon probably refers to the brief description in his own Synopsis of 1839, p. 103, a copy of which no doubt accompanied him up the Missouri. He had described and figured what he supposed to be Emberiza pallida in the Orn. Biogr. v., 1839, p. 66, pi. 398, fig. 2; B. Amer. iii., 1841, p. 71, pl. 161, from specimens taken in the Rocky Mts. by J. K. Townsend, June 15, 1834. But this bird was not the true pallida of Swainson, being that afterwards called Spizella breweri by Cassin, Pr. Acad. Philad., 1856, p. 40, The true pallida of Swainson is what Audubon described as Emberiza shattuckii, B. Amer. vii., 1844, p. 347, pi. 493- naming it for Dr. Geo. C. Shattuck, of Boston, one of his Labrador companions. He speaks of it as "abundant throughout the country bordering the upper Missouri;" and all mention in the present Journal of the "Clay-colored Bunting," or "Emberiza pallida" refers to what Audubon later named Shattuck's Bunting—not to what he gives as Emberiza pallida in the Orn. Biog. and Synopsis of 1839; for the latter is Spizella breweri.—E. C.
