Todd-Carriker : Birds of Santa Marta Region^ Colombia. 23 



ing field for an ornithologist — this isolated mass of mountains, whose 

 snowy peaks, visible from far out on the Caribbean Sea, form so strik- 

 ing a feature in the scenery of the northern coast of South America." 

 Their exploration was intrusted to Frederick A. A. Simons, a young 

 man with the training of a civil engineer, and who had had some 

 previous experience in tropical Africa. He landed at Rio Hacha in 

 January, 1878, and at once proceeded overland to Valle de Upar, which 

 he made his headquarters for some time, using it as a base for his 

 excursions in various directions. During February and March his 

 operations extended to Atanquez and San Jose, on the southern slope 

 of the mountain, and west to the Valley of Chinchicua and San Sebas- 

 tian. For the month of May he was located at Manaure, a coffee 

 plantation in the foothills of the Eastern Andes. His first attempt 

 to ascend the Sierra, by way of San Sebastian, appears to have been 

 made in June of that year, on which occasion he reached the foot of 

 ■the large field of snow which covers the highest point, above the sources 

 of the Rio Aracataca. A second attempt made in July by way of the 

 Rio Guatapuri took him across the pass over the Paramo de Chiruqua 

 and down the northern slopes to the Caribbean Sea. He seems to have 

 been at Chirua in August, and at San Antonio and Guallabal in August 

 and September, but very few birds were collected on this trip. In 

 December, 1878, and up until April of the following year, he collected 

 at Santa Marta and its vicinity, going as far south as Arihueca, and 

 later in the season retraced his route of the previous year over the 

 high Sierra Nevada, doing considerably more bird collecting on this 

 occasion, up to an altitude of 14,000 feet. 



It is not possible at present to trace Simons' movements in detail 

 after the end of July, 1879, inasmuch as Salvin and Godman's report 

 on his collections, from which the above summary has been mainly 

 worked out, does not carry the subject beyond that date. We know, 

 however, that he continued work for some time thereafter, both from 

 his own account and from the circumstance that in various later 

 volumes of the Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum we find 

 listed additional species and specimens which are attributed to him. 

 He returned to England in 1881, after three and a half years' residence 

 in the Santa Marta region, but it does not appear that all of this time 

 was devoted to natural history work. In later years he seems to have 

 entered the service of the Colombian Government to do surveying and 

 mapping. His death occurred in 1917. 



