^°898^] Nelson, Wil/i Bob-xvkiie in Mexico. 



119 



arose from a bash or low tree. At an altitude of about 3000 feet 

 we passed out of their range and did not find them again until we 

 readied the valley of Comitan, on the Guatemalan border, where 

 their notes were heard. A few miles farther on, just after enter- 

 ing Guatemala, a single female, which proved to be quite different 

 from those taken in Mexico, was brought me by an Indian. This 

 specimen served as the type of the Guatemala Bob-white {Colhius 

 insignis Nelson). Beyond this nothing was learned of them in 

 these remote parts. 



From Comitan valley we made a long circuit over the Guate- 

 malan highlands and reached the Pacific coast again on the 

 border of Chiapas. There, on some grassy prairies in the midst 

 of the forested coast plain, a few miles back from the sea, we 

 found many Bob-whites of a previously unknown branch of the 

 family.^ In this vicinity an attempt was made many years ago 

 to establish a large colony of Americans. They came with great 

 flourish of trumpets and large expectations, but the climate did 

 its silent work so effectually that two or three stranded relics 

 were all that remained. Over the desolate sun-scorched flats 

 near by, the same cheery call of the Quail sounded in the ears 

 of the Mexican ox-drivers and muleteers as they carried their 

 cargoes of coffee and cacao to the coast, that I had heard from 

 many a field and thicket over thousands of miles of varied 

 country to the north. Among these sturdy little Americans there 

 appeared no sign of degeneration, and it was pleasanter to meet 

 them than some of my countrymen of a larger growth. So many 

 failures at colonizing people from the north in these hot southern 

 lands had come to my notice that I had become skeptical of 

 its successful accomplishment in any instance ; yet here in the 

 tropics were the Bob-whites, essentially a group of the temperate 

 regions, living as cheerfully as possible and upsetting my pre- 

 conceived ideas. 



After passing some time in this district we hired an ox cart 

 one evening and were trundled across the plains to the coast 

 during the cool hours of the night. There, on the sandy shore, 

 we waited ten days for a steamer which finally carried us back to 



' Colimes salvini Nelson. 



