64 Nelson — Description of New Birds from Mexico. 



and Tehuantepec ; also from Yucatan, Honduras, Salvador, and Nicaragua. 

 Throughout this wide range the species holds its characters with surpris- 

 ingly little variation. A. cinnamomea inhabits areas overgrown with 

 scrubby forest of an arid tropical character. .1. c. saturata was found in 

 the borders of the great humid tropical forests of the foothills in southern 

 Chiapas, and probably ranges along the slopes of these mountains into 

 western Guatemala. A single specimen from Tehuantepec is intermediate 

 between true cinnamomea and saturata, upon the strength of which I have 

 given the present bird subspecific rank. 



Revision of the genus DACTYLORTYX Ogilvie-Grant. 



Dactylortyx Ogilvie-Grant, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., XXII, 429, 1893. Type 

 Ortyx thoracicus Gambel. 



In the Proceedings of the Philadelphia Academy of Sciences for 1848 

 (vol. IV, p. 77), Dr. Gambel described Ortyx thoracicus from a specimen 

 obtained by Mr. Pease at Jalapa, Vera Cruz, Mexico. In 1850 Mr. 

 Gould published his Odontophorus lineolatus, giving a colored figure of both 

 sexes and a description of the female (Mon. Odont. Ill, pi. 32, with text, 

 1850). ( lould's figures and description were based on a pair of birds in 

 the Berlin Museum, labeled by Lichtenstein with the unpublished name 

 Perdix lineolata- These birds came from Mexico without any definite 

 locality, and Gould considered them identical with Gambel's species, but 

 used Lichtenstein' s manuscript name. In 1893 Ogilvie-Grant made the 

 genus Dactylortyx to receive the birds described by Gambel and Gould, 

 which lie considered identical and called Dactylortyx thoracicus. He gave 

 the range of D. thoracicus as 'Central America; southern Mexico, Yuca- 

 tan, Guatemala, and San Salvador.' There is good reason to doubt that 

 any species of grouse or partridge ranges over this area. The material at 

 hand proves that Ogilvie-Grant's D. thoracicus is a composite species in- 

 cluding several distinct birds. 



Through the courtesy of Mr. Wittner Stone, Conservator of the Orni- 

 thological Section of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, I 

 have examined two specimens of true D. thoracicus from Jalapa, Mexico, 

 one of which is Dr. Gambel's type. Unfortunately both are females and 

 1 have no male of the typical form to compare with the males of the 

 others recognized below. The amount of individual variation does not 

 appear to be great, judging from the two specimens of D. thoracicus and 

 four specimens of the species in Chiapas and Guatemala, here described 

 as D. chiapensis. After comparing the two typical specimens of 1>. th<>- 

 racicus (Gambel) with Gould's plate and description of the female of his 

 0. lineolatus, 1 am satisfied that they represent birds which are at least 

 subspecifically distinct. The left-hand figure in Gould's plate represents 

 a male and agrees very closely with a specimen in the U. S. National Mu- 

 seum, obtained by Mr. Sumichrast on the (Jineta Mt., near Santa Efigenia, 

 Oaxaca. This place is on the Pacific slope of Mexico near the border of 

 Chiapas and gives a definite locality for the birds of this form. The 

 species and subspecies recognizable in the material before me may be 

 briefly characterized as follows: 



