348 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



An account of the vegetation of the island based upon his collection 

 was published by Sereno Watson in Volume 11 of the Proceedings of 

 the American Academy, 1876; and a description of the birds by Eobert 

 Ridgway in a bulletin of the Hayden Survey.' 



Immediately after his return from Guadalupe Island Dr. Palmer 

 began to collect botanical and ethnological material in southern Cali- 

 fornia for the approaching Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia. It 

 was at this time that he crossed the boundary line into Mexican terri- 

 tory and made his famous collection of plants in the great canyon of the 

 Cantillas Mountains, in the northern part of Lower California, a lo- 

 cality never before visited by a botanist, which yielded a number of 

 new and interesting species. The collections were of special importance, 

 and added much to the knowledge of the botany of the region. Many 

 of Dr. Palmer's notes were embodied by Gray and "Watson in their 

 " Botany of California," which was then in preparation. He also 

 visited the Diegueno Indians of southern California and obtained val- 

 uable material illustrating their arts and habits of life ; their weapons, 

 baskets, pottery, foods and medicines. 



On one of his collecting expeditions near the Lower California 

 boundary line he came upon a party of almost naked Cocopa Indians 

 gathering their annual supply of pine nuts, the fruit of Pinus quadri- 

 folia. 



" It was an interesting sight," said he, " to see these children of 

 nature with their dirty laughing faces, parching and eating the pine 

 nuts. They had already filled many bags and were eating them by the 

 handful. Indeed we found the piiiones to be rich and well-flavored, 

 and we were not satisfied with few. "We realized that these happy free 

 people were in their natural habitat here beneath the pines. At last we 

 had the privilege of seeing primitive Americans gathering their un- 

 cultivated crop from primaeval groves." 



Another plant collected by Dr. Palmer proved to be the type of a 

 new genus, which Professor Gray named Palmerella in his honor, 

 stating that he did so in acknowledgment of Dr. Palmer's " indefatig- 

 able and fruitful explorations of the botany of the southwestern fron- 

 tiers of the United States, from Arizona to the islands off Lower Cali- 

 fornia, in which region he has accomplished more than all his 

 predecessors." 



Dr. Palmer sent a fine collection of woods to Dr. Vasey, who was 

 preparing an exhibit of forest trees of America for the Centennial Ex- 

 position. 



• Ridgway, Robert, " Ornithology of Guadalupe Island, Based on the Notes 

 and Collections made by Dr. Edward Palmer," Bull. Hayden Surwy, No. 2, p. 

 183, 1876. See also by the same author, "The Birds of Guadalupe Island, Dis- 

 cussed with Reference to the Present Genesis of Species," Bull. Nuttall 

 Omitholog. Club, Vol. 2, p. 58, 1877. 



