Having paid much attention to the birds of Southern Mexico, Guatemala and the adjoining republics of Central America, I have found it a general rule that this northern portion of the great South-American (or Neotropical) region possesses specifically distinct representatives of all the more important groups which characterize the Ornithology of Tropical South America. It not unfrequently happens that these northern outliers of the genus are the finest in colouring and the most outré or exaggerated in form, of the whole group. In illustration of this remark I may adduce the case of the Guatemalan Cotinga (Cotinga amabilis)—certainly pre-eminent in coloration even among this lovely brotherhood. The naked-throated Umbrella-bird (Cephalopterus glabricollis) of Veragua, the Three wattled Fruit-eater (Chasmorhynchus tricarunculatus) of the same country, and the celebrated Long-tailed Trogon or Quesál of the mountains of Vera Paz (Trogon paradiseus) are other instances of the same kind, and the list might be still further extended without much difficulty. When the Quadrumana of the trans-panamanic province are properly worked out, I believe it will be found that each of the leading genera of Tropical America possesses a representative within the limits of this special Fauna.
But first as regards the northern limit of the Quadrumana in the New World. This is given in the plate of Johnston's Physical Atlas by a line across Honduras, which is supposed to mark the northern limit of Mycetes seniculus. But I know of no authority for the occurrence of this Mycetes in Honduras, and the true limit of the family must be fixed, as I shall presently show, much further north.
The well-known German Naturalist, Deppe, who travelled in Mexico in 1824-7, writes in a letter dated from Xalapa, Feb. 18th, 1825:—
"In Alvarado[1] we heard that 15 or 18 leagues further south on the St. Martin we should find Monkeys. On Christmas-day we set out in a canoe with Indians to Hacatalpa, and here took horses to go to the mountains eight leagues farther. Having arrived at the appointed spot we were informed to our great sorrow that the Monkeys had deserted this locality three weeks since for a spot where fruit was more abundant. There were three species described to me, (1) a large white one, 4 feet high; (2) a smaller one, 212 feet high (apparently the same as that which I now send); and (3) a small one quite black. I was told that they would return in the beginning of February in large troops."
Dr. W. Peters, the Director of the Museum at Berlin, who has most kindly supplied me with the above extract, adds,
"Mr. Deppe, who is still alive and whom I questioned about the specimen in our Museum writes to me, 'I bought the Ateles alive in Alvarado. It was caught by a Mexican about twenty hours distant from the city. Afterwards, on my journey from Caxaia to Alvarado, I watched, in a forest near Valle Beal, a great number of the same
- ↑ Deppe remained in Alvarado during December, 1824, and January, 1825.
