No. 3. — Reports on the Dredging Operations off the West Coast 

 of Central America to the Galapagos, to the West Coast of M< c- 

 ico, and in the Gulf of California, in charge of ALEXANDER 

 Agassiz, carried on by the U. S. Fish Commission Steamer 

 "Albatross" during 1891, Lieut. Commander Z. L. Tannek, 

 U. S. N., Commanding. 



(Published by permission of Marshall McDonald, U. S. Fish Commissioner.] 



XVII. 



Birds from Cocos and Malpelo Islands, with Notes on Petrels obtained at 

 Sea. By C. H. Townsend. 



Previous to the time the " Albatross " called at Cocos Island, on 

 February 28, 1891, nothing was known of its birds further than that 

 it was the home of a pecnliar cuckoo (Coccyzus ferrugineus, Gould), a 

 single specimen of which was obtained during the voyage of H. M. S. 

 "Sulphur," about the year 1840. 



Although the collection made by the " Albatross " is a small one, but 

 three additional genera (and species) of land birds having been found, 

 it is interesting as showing ornithological relationship between Cocos 

 Island and the Galapagos Archipelago. 



Cocos Island is about 275 miles distant from Costa Rica, in latitude 

 5° 32' 57" N., longitude 87° 2' 10" W. It occupies a position nearly 

 midway between the mainland and the islands of the Galapagos group, 

 and with the exception of Malpelo Island, an inaccessible barren rock off 

 the Gulf of Panama, is the only connecting point of land. Like the 

 Galapagos Islands, it is of volcanic origin, and has received its peculiar 

 animal and vegetable forms from the mainland. The American origin 

 of the forms of life upon the Galapagos Islands was demonstrated by 

 Darwin, who made researches there more than half a century ago. It 

 appears from a study of the birds alone, that Cocos Island is similarly a 



VOL. XXVII. — NO. 3. 



