my instructions, I paid the cost of the voyage (about $5oo) and did not ask for any remuneration,—in fact, I have never received a cent for specimens or for any collecting I have done, nor would I have accepted money for my work.
During the winters of 1881-2 and 1882-3 I collected in the Cape region, from La Paz to Cape San Lucas, excepting the time that I was at Guaymas which was nearly all of December, 1882, and a part of April, 1883. My outfit from Washington did not accompany me to Guaymas and the Mexican customs officials would not pass it across the line at Nogales, but I afterward found it at La Paz, whence it had been forwarded from San Francisco by express. My collecting in the Cape region was satisfactory, notwithstanding some hardships I endured. The region is mostly a semi-desert, water is scarce and I several times suffered for the want of it. I made the mistake of collecting many things of which I knew little or nothing, instead of confining myself almost entirely to birds. Had I done this, one winter's collecting would have satisfied me quite as well as two.
I found San Jose del Cabo the best field of the low country and the Victoria mountains the best of the mountainous parts. I have often wondered why the sharp-eyed, indefatigable Xantus did not see Geothlyfiis beldingi on the San Jose river, where he spent a great deal of time, and also if it had rapidly changed since he was there some thirty years before. I do not think he was ever in the Victoria mountains or he would have found the very common Junco bairdi and other common birds of these mountains, which are known to the California Academy scientists as Laguna,—a decided misnomer—as the little lagoon that once existed at the lower end of a little valley, went down the mountain during a violent rainstorm which cut away a natural dam that held it. Then there are quite a number of lagunas or lagoons in the Cape Region.
The second time I was in the Cape Region I took only seventy or eighty bird skins, for I did not wish to get many. I consumed about a week of this time in getting two specimens of the new rail, Rallus beldingi. I only heard of one man at La Paz who had ever seen one and several hunters were surprised when I showed them one of the birds. These birds can best be obtained at low tide when they move about in the mangrove thickets in search of food. I got my specimens by patiently waiting for them to pass comparatively open spots in the mangle. I rode sixteen consecutive days without skinning a bird, though I occasionally shot them when in doubt of the species. My collecting basket during that time contained two very interesting aboriginal skulls which Dr. ten Kate and I got in a cavern. I have travelled considerably in the northern part of the peninsula, having, on one trip, been absent from San Diego sixteen days. I was at Laguna, which is about sixty miles south of Campo, in May, 1885. I secured three specimens of Sitta pygmæa leuconucha at this laguna. A few days later I tried in San Francisco to get specimens of S. pygmæa to compare with them, but did not succeed in finding a solitary specimen. I then donated the specimens to the National Museum.
About this time I thought it time for me to stop ornithological study unless we could have a good study collection of bird skins in California, and thinking the Academy the right place for such a collection, I advised all or many of my California correspondents to contribute to the California Academy of Sciences. I believe that advice has borne some fruit, but not as much as it should have borne. I knew that under the trinomial system, hair-splitting would be almost without limit. I had noticed local differentiations, but could do nothing without many specimens for comparison, and after all, "was the game worth the candle?" I doubted it. As nearly as I remember, in 1876, only two Screech Owls were credited to the United States. Now there are about a dozen subspecies and the Horned Larks have multiplied in like proportion. I remember reading a good article in the Auk some years since, in which the writer, Dr. Allen, asks in substance if it is profitable to name these slight divergencies. Nevertheless much can be said in favor of
