TROPICAL AMERICA. SIEXICO. 69 



with in the province of Texas, are the buffalo, or bison, 

 known in England as the bonassus, and which enters 

 Texas from the north, in vast herds, during the winter; 

 the panther, leopard, bear, otter, beaver, antelope, deer, 

 racoon, black fox, &c. The horses, descended from the 

 Spanish Arabians, have peopled the rich plains of Texas 

 with droves innumerable. These wild horses are often 

 large or heavy, but show blood ; and, if caught young, 

 are very docile ; although, whenever an opportunity 

 offers, they are apt to rejoin their wild brethren." * It 

 is impossible to ascertain what animals are here called 

 " panthers and leopards," since these names strictly 

 belong to African quadrupeds ; nor are we specifically 

 acquainted with any determinate species of antelopes or 

 deer peculiar to Mexico. 



(97.) On the ornithology of Mexico, our knowledge, 

 comparatively, is much more advanced. Several col- 

 lections of birds, formed by our countrymen now re- 

 sident on the table land, have been transmitted to this 

 country, and forwarded for our examination. The 

 results are highly interesting. Of ] 14 species t of land 

 birds whose characters we have thus had the means of 

 ascertaining, sixty-seven, or more than one half, have 

 never been discovered in any other country. Eleven 

 are natives of Mexico and of South America, and thirty- 

 six are found both in Mexico and the United States. 

 It may be urged, that so large a proportion of animals, 

 in one class only, being found on the American isthmus, 

 is surely sufficient to constitute it a distinct zoological 

 province : but it must be remembered, that this pecu- 

 liarity extends only to species. For it is a singular fact, 

 that not more than one new genus {Ptiliogonys Swains.) 

 is to be found in the entire number of 114< species. 

 This is one of the most interesting genera recently dis- 

 covered, being that by which nature has connected the 

 family of tyrant shrikes ( Tyrannina), with that of the 



* Mexico, vol. ii. p. 435. 



■f- These species are enumerated in Murray's Encyclopjedia of Geo- 

 graphy, p. 13S3. 



F 3 



