GAMBEL’S QUAIL 93 
myself, have witnessed. Much further south Colonel 
McCall found birds at Alamo Mucho, forty-four miles 
west of the Colorado; but still the desert is in effect 
the barrier I have represented, and the two quails, 
speaking generally, do not meet. One wonders the 
less at this who has any good idea of the Colorado 
desert, such as may be gained, for example, from the 
following passage from Colonel McCall’s article, which 
remains associated in my mind with the plumed quails, 
with all the freshness of first impressions. Speaking 
of the Alamo, where he shot a pair, “Here is in truth 
a desert!’ exclaims the colonel. ‘Figure to yourself, 
if you can, a portion of this fair earth where for some 
hundreds of miles the whole crust seems to have been 
reduced to ashes by the action of internal fires; behold 
a vast plain of desolation, surrounded, and at intervals 
intersected, by abrupt mountain ranges which are little 
better than gigantic heaps of scoria. Imagine this scen- 
ery to be actually glowing under the direct rays of the 
midsummer sun, and you may have some idea of the 
prospect that meets the eye of the traveler who looks 
out upon the desert from the well of the Alamo. You 
may perceive in his rear a few stunted cottonwood trees, 
scattered along the edge of a channel in which appar- 
ently water once was, but now is not; while around 
him, here and there, is a light-leaved mesquite that 
stretches forth its slender arms and appears to invite 
him to a shade that is but a mockery. Here it was that 
I first heard the plaintive voice of this bird as he strove 
to cheer his mate while occupied in the tedious task 
