THE OOLOGIST 



WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO? 



Some of our correspondents wonder 

 how it is tliat we are able to secure 

 so many of the rarer varieties of 

 Northern eggs and skins. The follow- 

 ing is a letter from one of our collect- 

 ors received during the month of 

 March, 1922. He is only one of a num- 

 ber who are wandering through the far 

 Northern Artie wastes, atid with an 

 eye continually on the lookout for 

 specimens to add to our collection. 



We but recently received a lot of 

 specimens taken by an Artie explorer, 

 on one of the islands northwest of the 

 Hudson Bay, who left Seattle in 1916 

 and only got back in 1921. The ves- 

 sel having been disabled and during 

 all of that time he was a semi-prisoner, 

 held in the grip of the pitiless North. 

 The following is a' part of the letter 

 referred to we have just received. 



R. M. B. 



"It is now definitely decided I shall 

 leave here June 1st with a 65 foot 

 power-boat. I shall take what is 

 called the "inside passage," north 

 along the coast of British Columbia 

 and Alaska through Unimak Pass of 

 the Aleutian Isles and thence to Nome, 

 Alaska. From Nome I shall cross 

 Behring's Strait to East Cape, Siberia 

 by way of Diomede Isle and then fol- 

 low the Siberia'n coast N. W. as the 

 ice permits and if the season is favor- 

 able so that we are not stopped by 

 ice I intend to winter on Kolyma 

 River, the mouth of which is about 

 400 miles west off Wranged Island or 

 if we have a very open year, I will at- 

 tempt to go as far as Indigirka, this 

 is the next large river west from the 

 Kolyma and has never been visited by 

 any ship. If prevented by ice from 

 going as planned I shall go as far 

 west as possible and winter and con- 

 tinue next year and shall in any event 

 be gone for at least two years." 



A LETTER 



I have just received the February 

 number of the Oologist, which I con- 

 sider one of the choicest numbsrj 

 that has been published in a long time. 

 There is nothing that comes to my 

 desk that I am so glad to receive as I 

 am the little old Oologist, and I have 

 reasons for the feeling, which I will 

 endeavor to explain. 



Over thirty years ago I secured my 

 first job, and it is the only job I ever 

 had, for since I left it I have paddled 

 my own canoe. I was interested in 

 natural history, I guess, when I was 

 born, and when a mere lad the famous 

 "Lattin" establishment was in it? 

 most palmy days. Mr. Frank Lattin, 

 recognizing my taste for such work 

 was kind enough to give me a position 

 in his establishment, and during the 

 few years that I was with him I had 

 the pleasure of handling an untold 

 number of birds' eggs, and have never 

 lost my interest. 



Although I have not contributed 

 mucli in the publicity line, yet I have 

 all these years been just as thorough- 

 ly interested as when I was a kid, and 

 during these years I have been doing 

 some collecting, but mostly by proxy. 



Some months ago in tlie Oologist 

 ycu asked your readers for informa- 

 tion in reference to the larger collec- 

 tions of North American birds' eggs, 

 and it might be of interest for me to 

 say that my collection comprises 693 

 complete sets of different species of 

 North American birds' eggs, in full 

 sets with complete data, and over 275 

 foreign species in complete sets. Of 

 course many of the North American 

 species I have in small series. I have 

 recently completed a new cabinet for 

 holding the collection, which com- 

 prises 45 large drawers filled to ca- 

 pacity. In addition to this I have a 

 collection of nearly 1,000 mounted 

 birds, and quite a' large collection of 

 mounted mammals. 



