1886] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 125 



CATALOGUE OF ANIMALS COLLECTED BY THE GEOGRAPHICAL 

 AND EXPLORING COMMISSION OP THE REPUBLIC OF MEXICO. 



B7 FERIVAiXDO FERRARI-PEREZ, 



Chief of the Natural History Section. 



PREFATORY NOTE. 



The Geographical and Exploring Commission of the Republic of 

 Mexico was established by an act of Congress in the year 1877 at the 

 recommendation of the President of the Republic, General Porfirio Diaz, 

 and finally organized at the end of 1878. At that time the Commission 

 consisted only of the Director, Mr. Agustiu Diaz, C. E., who still holds 

 the same position, and four more engineers detailed by the Department 

 of Public Works (Secreteria de Fomento). The original object of the 

 Commission was the preparation of a general map of the Republic, 

 the previous non-existence of such a map being due to the accidental 

 loss of the plans and the data pertaining to an earlier topographical 

 survey of the country. 



In view of the important results obtained during a short period of 

 work, and at the suggestion of the Director, the Secretary of War, 

 toward the end of 1879, resolved to approve the augmentation of the 

 Commission by ten ofiBcers, engineers of the scientific corps of the gen- 

 eral staff, and to appoint the j)resent writer as Naturalist of the Com- 

 mission. By this enlargement the Commission obtained such palpable 

 results that the Government was subsequently induced to increase its 

 facilities by appointing additional members whenever it was found de- 

 sirable, until the Commission now consists of twenty engineers appointed 

 by the Secretary of Public Works and thirty by the Secretary of War. 



In the astronomical, geodetic, and topographical branches the follow- 

 ing results have been obtained to date: 26 plans of cities, towns, and 

 villages, some drawn to a scale of 1 : 5,000 and others to a scale of 1 : 

 10,000 ; 13 sheets of the topographical chart of the surroundings of 

 Pueblo to a scale of 1 : 20,000, already published ; 30 sheets of the geo- 

 graphical chart of the Republic to a scale of 1 : 100,000 (the publication 

 of which by the Government has not yet been consummated), each one 

 of these sheets comprising an area of 212,000 hectares, consequently the 

 thirty sheets already completed have together a total area of 6,360,000 

 hectares, equal to 15,715,560 acres. Each one of these sheets is accom- 

 panied by a volume constituting an atlas which contains on a large 

 scale all the details and data pertaining to its history. The following- 

 States are represented in their entire extent : The Federal District, 

 Puebla, Tlaxcala, and Morelos; while only portions of Hidalgo, Mexico, 

 Vera Cruz, Xuevo Leon, and Taraaulipas are included. Special maps 

 of each State will be published as soon as all the sheets of the general 



