LIZARD CNEMIDOPHORUS PERPLEXUS — MASLIN, ET AL. 337 



the East. Information in the Niles' National Register letter makes it 

 possible to designate the arrival date at Santa Fe as July 2, 1841. 



Gambel was in the vicinity of Santa Fe, along the Rio Grande and 

 in the nearby mountains, for the period from July 2 to about Sep- 

 tember 1. He made representative collections of plants, especially 

 from the "sandy hills along the borders of the Rio del Norte, Santa Fe 

 (Mexico)." The Rio Grande River lies about 20 miles west of Santa 

 Fe and today is generally inaccessible bj'" highway in this area. Dur- 

 ing Gambel's visit, however, the main road from the east crossed 

 Santa Fe Creek near the town and continued to the Rio Grande along 

 the south side of this creek, thence turning south towards Albu- 

 querque. It would seem justifiable to assume that Gambel gained 

 access to the Rio Grande collecting localities by means of this road. 

 Thus, specimens from "Rio del Norte, Santa Fe" presumably were col- 

 lected south of the entrance of Santa Fe Creek into the Rio Grande 

 River, west and southwest of Santa Fe. 



None of the plant collections or bird observations warrant suspect- 

 ing that Gambel went far south of Santa Fe; but one of the species 

 of reptiles he collected suggests that he might have. This species, 

 Holbrookia texana, extends up the Rio Grande Valley as far as Valencia 

 County (4 miles north of Sabinal). It might even extend as far north 

 as Albuquerque; but the likelihood of its occurring in Santa Fe is 

 questionable. Although he makes comments about birds at Taos, it 

 seems unlikely that Gambel went that far north. One of his com- 

 ments concerns wintering juncos, and certainly he was not there during 

 the winter. He probably learned about Taos birds from people in 

 Santa Fe. 



On or within a day or so after September 1 , Gambel departed from 

 New Mexico, supposedly from Abiquiu, with John Workman's party 

 for California. This party is reported to have traveled northwest 

 from New Mexico across southwestern Colorado, over the Colorado 

 and Green Rivers in eastern Utah in September, into the mountains 

 south of Salt Lake, then southwest across mountains and desert to 

 southern California. There is some variance in arrival dates in Cali- 

 fornia between the Workman party and Gambel, the former arriving 

 in early November and the latter "the last of November being three 

 month's traveling over Rocky Mountains & barren deserts . . . ." The 

 difference in arrival dates maj^ simply mean that Gambel took time 

 out for exploration on his own or with a small detached party some- 

 where en route. 



In considering the most likely localities from which Gambel might 

 have made his collections of reptiles on this first California expedition, 

 the valley of the Rio Grande River southwest of Santa Fe seems the 

 most probable choice, especially with respect to Cnemidophorus per- 

 plexus. Inasmuch as Gambel's type specimen was a female contain- 



