:::r.::::*< TWO BIRD -LOVERS IN MEXICO j*--"-: 



breath of air sets each of these many seeds vibrating 

 witliin their hollow spheres, producing a sweet, sifting 

 tinkle, comparable to nothing I have ever heard in 

 Nature. 



In the Guadalajara ditches we began to realize that 

 Mexico is a land of thorns and spines. Indeed the seeds 

 are about equally divided between those furnished with 

 hooks or spines, and tliose intended to be wafted away 

 by the wind. One low, spreading bush has a double 

 chance for distributing its seeds. When it dries up, the 

 stalk breaks oil" almost at the first l)reath of air, and 

 the light, tliorny mass, more or less globular in shape, 

 is rolled and tunil)led far across the fiekls. Several 

 times a number of these buslies blew toward us so rap- 

 idly that we could not escape them, althougli we knew 

 from experience that mucli time and patience would be 

 necessary to free our clothing from the barbed and 

 rebarbed burrs. 



How we wished for handbooks to name all the seeds 

 and plants, but the ])rice one must pay for the pleasure 

 of raml)ling among birds and flowers in a little-known 

 country is that one must, like Adam, give his own arbi- 

 trary common names to many of tlie objects he ob- 

 serves. It is very disappointing, too, when one returns 

 and finds that an appropriate title which one has 

 bestowed and which, from daily repetition for months, 

 has become closely associated with the bird or flower, 

 must be replaced by the name of some describer or 



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