60 IN THE WILDS OF SOUTH AMERICA 



sylvestris), lived in the taller herbage. It had a piping note 

 that could be clearly heard fifty yards away, but the agile 

 bird was hard to see on account of its obscure color and 

 mouse-like habits that kept it constantly in the thickest 

 cover. Numerous marsh-wrens (Cistothorus cequatorialis) in- 

 habited the sedges, scolding and nervously flitting about. 



More interesting than the foregoing, however, were large 

 Andean snipe (Gallinago nobilis) bearing at least a super- 

 ficial resemblance to the American woodcock. Single in- 

 dividuals or pairs of these birds were found running over 

 the bogs and drilling in the soft earth. In many places the 

 ground was perforated with dozens of the deep, symmetri- 

 cal holes where the tireless workers had labored diligently 

 for a meal. Shooting them w r as good sport. They sprang 

 into the air with a piping bleat and then sped away in a 

 zigzag course for fifty or a hundred yards, dropped back 

 to earth and instantly merged into their surroundings so 

 completely as to be invisible. 



The finches were perhaps better represented than any 

 other family of birds. A few goldfinches, in small bands, 

 frequented the flowering shrubs. A kind of slaty finch 

 (Phrygilus unicolor grandis) was far more abundant and 

 fairly evenly distributed over the entire paramo. We dis- 

 covered a nest of this species among the grass at the base 

 of a frailejon; the structure was beautifully made of down 

 taken from the leaves of the plants that sheltered it. It 

 contained two pear-shaped eggs of a greenish color heavily 

 speckled with fine dull-brown dots. 



From a distance the small lake at the head of the valley 

 appeared to be a promising field for investigation. It 

 yielded, however, but a solitary Andean teal greatly resem- 

 bling the gad wall (Chaulelasmus) , that was swimming on 

 the unruffled water, and when this had been taken our 

 work in that particular spot was completed. The bottom 

 of the pond was covered with a solid mass of long algce far 

 out as we could see; these concealed any aquatic life that 

 may have existed in the chilly depths. 



