754 Annals of the Carnegie Museum. 



examining any material from that country, but it would not surprise me 

 to find that they are the same as Costa Rican and Panaman birds. I can 

 do no better than to quote a portion of Mr. Bangs' article in which he sums 

 up the obvious facts in the matter. 



"(i) Difference of size in Central American specimens of Microcerculus 

 are not great enough or constant enough to be of diagnostic value. 



(2) Specimens in immature plumage from one locality show a wide 

 range of variation in color and markings (possibly due to the age of the 

 individual, it requiring more than one month to acquire the adult plumage). 



(3) Specimens in adult plumage, or nearly so, are subject to a slight 

 seasonal variation in color, but apart from this can not be satisfactorily 

 distinguished from such remote places lying in such different faunal areas 

 as northeastern Costa Rica on the one hand and southwestern Costa Rica 

 and Chiriqui on the other." 



As additional evidence against the probability of differences between the 

 birds of the Caribbean and Pacific slopes, I may cite the fact that the range 

 of the bird (with respect to altitude) is very broad, covering the whole slope 

 from about 1,500 feet up to at least 7,000 feet, so that it would be a very 

 easy matter in many places in Costa Rica for birds from one side of the 

 divide to pass over to the other. For example, the two birds secured at 

 Ujurras were taken within six or eight hundred feet of the crest of the 

 continental divide, which is very narrow at that point, dropping down 

 abruptly on the opposite side into the valley of the Cueng, one of the 

 largest tributaries of the Sicsola, which drains the whole of Talamanca. 



534. Salpinctes guttatus Salvin and Godman. 



Salpinctes guttatus Salvin and Godman, Ibis, 1891, 609 (Volcan de San Miguel, 

 Salvador, 4,000 feet, coll. Salvin and Godman). — Underwood, Ibis, 1896, 

 433 (Miravalles, Costa Rica; first record for C. R.). — Ridgway, Birds N. 

 and Mid. Amer., Ill, 1904, 653 (Volcan de San Miguel, Salvador; Volcan 

 de Conchagua, Salvador ? ; Volcan de Miravalles, Costa Rica ?). 



C. H. Lankester Collection: Miravalles. 



Carnegie Museum: Volcan de Miravalles (Carriker and Lankester). 



Nine specimens. 



It has always been suspected by ornithologists in this country that the 

 Rock Wren, occurring in Costa Rica on the Volcan de Miravalles, was 

 different from S. guttatus of Salvador, so that to settle the matter once for 

 all, Mr. Bangs and myself sent a series of skins from Miravalles to the 

 British Museum, where they were carefully compared with the types of 



