. BIRDS IN THE MUSEUM OF VASSAR COLLEGE. 1711 
mate facilitates the labor of harvest. The wheat and grain 
are threshed on their native field, bagged, and piled up 
against the fences till a convenient time for carrying them 
to market; and I often saw such huge piles of bagged wheat 
„and oats, that it required some stretch of fancy to imagine 
that it could all have grown in a single year within the area 
of the field. 
NOTES ON SOME BIRDS IN THE MUSEUM OF 
VASSAR COLLEGE. 
BY PROFESSOR JAMES ORTON. 
TuE Ornithological Cabinet in the Vassar Museum, con- 
tains nearly twelve hundred distinct species, of which seven 
hundred are North American, and the remainder South 
American. Among them are several type specimens and 
others of historical interest as the originals of Audubon's 
celebrated drawings. 
Falco islandicus Gm. This fine specimen formerly be- 
longed to Audubon, to whom it was presented by Sir John 
Cheperstal, and is the original of the figure in “Birds of 
merica." 
Accipiter nigroplumbeus Lawr. Tyre. This new hawk 
was obtained by the writer in the Valley of Quito, where it ° 
is very rare. 
Strix punctatissima Gray. Indigenous to the Galapagos, 
but now rather abundant in the Valley of Quito near the 
cotton-mills of Chillo, where it is called “Factory Owl.” It 
lays nearly spherical eggs, in a rude nest made of a small 
quantity of rubbish scraped together and lined with a few 
feathers, and generally built in the gable ends of houses or 
under the eaves. 
Trogon Mexicanus Sw. The late Mr. Giraud informed 
us that this specimen was shot in Texas. The Trogon fam- 
