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94 THE CONDOR VoL. XII cases of several small birds that I will not take the time to specify. Cultivation is, of course, the prime cause of this transformation. Most of the heavy. brush for many miles up, and the few miles that are wooded, down the river, has been re- moved, to make way for cultivated fields, that are quite a net work of irrigating canals. Hundreds of settlers have come into the Valley of late, to take up these lands, generally with mistaken ideas of a very new country, and liberally provided with guns. Of course they were more or less disappointed, tho it has (or did have) as great a variety of leathered game as any part of the United States. Unfortu- nately, this very condition may lead to a partial extermination of many species, for many of the settlers have an idea that the number of ducks, plover, quail, etc., is so unlimited that no closed season is necessary. So the game laws are liberally interpreted--and as laxly enforced. Nearing the Gulf Coast, going eastward from Brownsville, one approaches an open country comprising sand-dunes, and inundated flats, the latter caused by the seasonal overflow from the river. These swampy areas are the homes of many species of water-birds during the entire year; but especially so in winter when myriads of ducks, geese, herons, plovers and sandpipers resort to it. Near the mouth of the Rio Grande, along the coast, is a little fishing-village named Point Isabel, peopled principally by Mexicans. It is the terminus of a railroad from Brownsville, being twenty-six miles distant therefrom. I made this coast hamlet my headquarters for several months during the fall of 1908, and on several occas- ions, for brief periods since then. I do not care to put an estimate on the number of species of birds that could be found at one season or another within the territory I have just referred to, tho I imagine.it could produce a list greater than most Californian localities. Rather, I will in hap-hazard manner proceed to speak briefly of the characteristic species of the Valley; also of some of the more interesting migrants. I believe, well I am sure--that the bird I wanted to find most of all, was the one, that as yet, I have failed to meet within our borders. It is the Jacana (Jacana spinosa). Many a time I have discovered a spot suitable to its requirements along the river, but no Jacana appeared. So I conclude, that we can only include it on our lists as & casual summer visitor; for I know of but one taken here during the past two seasons. This example was secured along the river, half way to the coast by an old Mexican gunner, who had never shot a bird like it previously, in the many years he had hunted here. He brought the bird to the city, and sold'it to a local merchant who had it mounted. I examined this bird in the flesh, and re- corded the date of its capture--June 2, 1908. After the Jacana, it was the Chachalaca that reigned in my thoughts--and I had better fortune in this case, meeting it possibly a month after my arrival. Working thru some heavy brush one cloudy day, I was startled by a prodigious flapping of wing, accompanied by chuckling, turkey-like notes, all issuing from above. Lo, behold !---sitting not fifteen feet over my head, in a patriarchal ebony tree, were ten or more of as stupid looking aves as. ever I gazed upon. My pres- ence had caused this commotion, but no flight was resorted to, until I had shot into the flock. As already stated, the Chachalaca is no longer a common bird near here; and one may ride the country roads for many an evening, before its nocturnal notes sound in the ear. It it now seldom brought into market in numbers for sale, as was the case at the time Dr. Merrill wrote. The few that we do find for barter are live birds, mostly having been hatcht under a domestic hen--that being the fate of the eggs of any nest of the kind discovered here. Indeed, there must be more domesticated Chachalacas, varying in degrees of intermixture, than wild