50 



THE OOLOGIST 



rooms on an express river steamer 

 which leaves on the 13th and also for 

 staterooms on a German boat leaving 

 for the States on the 17th. 



Accordingly on the 13th we left 

 Honda for La Dorada, where we found 

 our river steamer, the 'Alicia.' She 

 was a fine big stern wheeler with 

 good cabins and excellent food. We 

 left La Dorada at 1 P. M. and after an 

 uneventful trip down the river ar- 

 rived once more at Barranquilla on 

 the morning of April 16th. Our ship 

 is not due until the twentieth so we 

 are stuck here for four days. Plague 

 rumors are increasing and it is very 

 uncomfortable. 



April 20th. We were up and off on 

 the morning train for Puerto Colom- 

 bia, as happy a crowd as ever traveled 

 on their way to the States, but is was 

 short lived happiness. On reaching 

 the steamer which was alreay tied up 

 at the pier, we were told that no pas- 

 sengers would be taken from Colom- 

 bian ports owing to the plague. We 

 waited for hours in vain hope that 

 they would relent and take us along. 

 We pleaded and threatened and insult- 

 ed the purser, but all to no purpose. 

 The steamer drew up her anchors and 

 cables and sailed away, leaving us 

 there, stranded! 



The rest is not a pleasant story to 

 read. I will skip all that and jump to 

 the happy day when a United Fruit 

 Liner, clean and big and white 

 steamed into Puerto Colombia, found 

 us with nothing but our tickets and 

 took us back to the good old U. S. A. 



Once aboard, our troubles vanished. 

 We ate and slept and enjoyed life as 

 only one can after months of roughing 

 it in South America. Below in the 

 hold, our three thousand birds and 

 animals were reposing safely. Our 

 only worry now was that that glorious 

 New York sky line would not loom 

 up soon enough. 



The End 



NEST VALUES 



The method of the proper valuation 

 of nests included with sets for ex- 

 change, seems to me never to have 

 been settled on a satisfactory basis. 

 Most men seemed to think a nest 

 should be valued at the price of one 

 egg; others set their own prices, while 

 still others use the valuations pre- 

 pared by Mr. A. M. Ingersoll for Tay- 

 lor's 1904 catalogue. Such a variety 

 of trade values would naturally lead 

 to some confusion if not hard feeling 

 between two persons using different 

 bases for exchange. A man using Mr. 

 Ingersoll's valuations, would natural- 

 ly be strongly inclined to apply the 

 rather objectionable term, highway 

 robber" to someone who placed a 

 $3.00 valuation in exchange on a nest 

 of Key West Vireo, while the possess- 

 or of the nest would probably be in- 

 clined the same apathy to anyone who 

 only offered $.25 for it. Such mis- 

 understanding is unquestionably un- 

 profitable to both collectors. The first 

 exchange would not cause a severance 

 of relations, nor probably the second, 

 but certainly if these conditions con- 

 tinued, and neither man changed his 

 basis of valuation, they would lose the 

 benefit of each other's correspondence 

 and future exchange. 



Now, as everyone knows, exchang- 

 ing is intended primarily to obtain 

 either new types of eggs or sets new 

 to a man's cabinet, and I secure the 

 best results in both cases, or perhaps 

 I should say in order that both men 

 secure the best quality of eggs, the 

 exchange would be entirely satisfact- 

 ory to both persons with nothing to 

 mar any future relationship, or, if I 

 may employ a little expressive slang, 

 with nothing to leave a bad taste in 

 either's mouth. To obtain these ends, 

 a common basis for exchange should 

 be settled on — a basis, understood by 

 both and backed up by fairness and 

 honesty. 



