84 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB 



species, S. decolor, has similar habits, is equally common, and is interesting 

 because it has diverged further from the ancestral Cuban prototype than 

 any other bird in the island. The Cuckoos of New Providence may have 

 been derived from Cuba long ago, and they have varied in very much 

 the same way, in both manner and degree. The Cuban bird is tawny, 

 but the bird from the Isle of Pines is bluish. Both resemble the Yellow- 

 billed Cuckoo in build, but are much larger, nearly twenty inches long. 



'Arriero, ' or Muleteer, is the name generally applied throughout 

 the Island, and it is derived from the harsh, grating call — tac-o, several 

 times repeated. In Oriente the call itself supplies the name of 'Taco'; the 

 Indian word Guicaica, also given by Gundlach, I never have heard. 



Everywhere about the edges of woods, in tangles of vines and creepers, 

 especially on hillsides, the ringing notes call one's attention to a long, 

 clumsy bird which hops constantly upward from limb to limb, and then 

 flutters earthward again, its tail fanned out and its round, inadequate 

 wings flapping desperately. This ceaseless hunt for lizards and locustids 

 goes on hour after hour, save that only during the heat of noon the noisy 

 voice is stilled. 



There will always be abandoned coffee plantations and overgrown 

 pastures and many rough limestone hills unfit for cultivation, so the Arriero 

 should ever remain a common bird. Guajiros still believe that its flesh has 

 valuable medicinal qualities and not only restores the appetite to convales- 

 cent invalids but possesses other virtues too intimate to be described. 



146. Coccyzus minor maynardi Ridgway. 

 Maynard's Mangrove Cuckoo. 



Since Ramsden has recorded two specimens of the Bahama Mangrove 

 Cuckoo from near Guantanamo (Auk, vol. 29, p. 398, 191 2), it is probable 

 that Gundlach's few records for C. minor refer to the same form. He had 

 found it once at Cardenas, at Nuevitas and Santiago de Cuba. 



147. Coccyzus americanus americanus (Linne). 

 Yellow-billed Cuckoo; Primaveva. 



The Yellow-billed Cuckoo is a migrant which, according to Gundlach, 

 arrives each spring and is common about the coasts, never being seen in 



