1834.] ZOOLOGY OF TIERRA DEL FUEGO. 239 



I have the word of Jemmy Button for saying, that neither 

 of these animals are found. 



The gloomy woods are inhabited by few birds ; occasion- 

 ally the plaintive note of a white-tufted tyrant-flycatcher 

 {Myiohiics albiceps) may be heard, concealed near the 

 summit of the most lofty trees ; and more rarely the loud 

 strange cry of a black woodpecker, with a fine scarlet crest 

 on its head. A little, dusky-coloured wren {Scytalopus 

 Magellanicv^) hops in a skulking manner among the 

 entangled mass of the fallen and decaying trunks. But the 

 creeper {Oxyumis tupinieri) is the commonest bird in the 

 country. Throughout the beech forests, high up and low 

 down, in the most gloomy, wet, and impenetrable ravines, 

 it may be met with. This little bird no doubt appears more 

 numerous than it really is, from its habit of following with 

 seeming curiosity any person who enters these silent woods ; 

 continually uttering a harsh twitter, it flutters from tree to 

 tree, withm a few feet of the intruder's face. It is far from 

 wishing for the modest concealment of the true creeper 

 {Certhia fatniliaris) ; nor does it, like that bird, run up the 

 trunks of trees, but industriously, after the manner of a 

 willow-wren, hops about, and searches for insects on every 

 twig and branch. In the more open parts, three or four 

 species of finches, a thrush, a starling (or Icterus)^ two 

 Opetiorhynchi, and several hawks and owls occur. 



The absence of any species whatever in the whole class of 

 reptiles, is a marked feature in the zoology of this country, 

 as well as in that of the Falkland Islands. 1 do not ground 

 this statement merely on my own observation, but I heard 

 it from the Spanish inhabitants of the latter place, and from 

 Jemmy Button with regard to Tierra del Fuego. On the 

 banks of the Santa Cruz, in 50* south, I saw a frog ; and it is 

 not improbable that these animals, as well as lizards, may 

 be found as far south as the Strait of Magellan, where the 

 country retains the character of Patagonia ; but within the 

 damp and cold limit of Tierra del Fuego not one occurs. 

 That the climate would not have suited some of the orders, 

 such as lizards, might have been foreseen ; but with respect 

 to frogs, this was not so obvious. 



Beetles occur in very small numbers : it was long before 

 1 could believe that a country as large as Scotland, covered 

 with vegetable productions and with a variety of stations, 

 could be so unproductive. The few which I found were 

 alpine species {Ilarpalida and HeteromidcB) living undei 



