Jan., 1920 AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL NOTES 4 9 
Parker’s’’ heart was to allow him to render you some substantial service. He 
died in San Francisco in 1888. 
MEET B. W. NELSON 
In the fall of this same year, on my way to Washington from California, |! 
made the acquaintance of E. W. Nelson in Chicago. He had become known to 
me through a record, published in the Bulletin of the Essex Institute, of the 
capture of specimens of the Sharp-tailed Finch near Chicago (subsequently de- 
scribed by Allen as Ammodromus caudacutus var. nelsom), and an exchange of 
specimens had followed. This casual visit of an hour or so was to prove the 
beginning of another life-long friendship, and to very materially affect Nel- 
son’s subsequent career. : 
Soon after my return to Washington, Prof. Baird offered me a chance to 
go to St. Michael’s, Alaska, as a signal observer, with a view of collecting and 
studying the fauna of the region. Though, in many ways, the offer was a tempt- 
ing one, I was too much interested in my work in the western states to aban- 
don it for a new field, but told him, in response to further questioning, that | 
knew exactly the man he was after. As a result Nelson accepted the offer im- 
mediately made him by Prof. Baird, and, as an employee of the Signal Service, 
spent nearly five years (1877-81) in the Arctic, which proved the initial step 
of his subsequent career as a naturalist. For the ornithological results ob- 
tained during Mr. Nelson’s memorable stay in Alaska I would refer the reader 
to his report published as No. 3 of the Arctic Series of the Signal Service. U. 
S. A., and entitled ‘‘Report upon Natural History Collections made in Alaska 
between the years 1877 and 1881’’. At the time of publication, as Mr. Nelson 
was sojourning in the west because of ill health, at the request of the Chief 
Signal Officer, Gen. A. W. Greeley, and himself, I undertook the pleasant task 
of editing the report and seeing it through the press. 
FIELD WORK OF 1877 
In 1877 the field work again began at Carson, where I spent the time be- 
tween May 12 and June 6. Leaving Carson we pursued a generally northern 
route till we reached old Camp Warner in southern Oregon, our field work end- 
ing October 1. About 200 specimens of birds were obtained during the season, 
and between six and seven hundred eggs were collected, chiefly of water birds. 
While at Goose Lake, northeastern California, I obtained specimens of a 
remarkable little rabbit, which Coues and Allen identified as the Trowbridge’s 
Hare (Lepus trowbridgei) but which later proved to be a new species, and was 
described by Merriam from specimens obtained by the Biological Survey in 
Idaho as the Idaho Rabbit (Brachylagus idahocnsis). 
While on a visit to Cambridge this year Mr. Brewster called my attention 
to some hummingbirds he had received from C. A. Allen of Nieasio, California. 
near which place the birds had been collected, and which the collector believed 
to be new. Sharing in this belief Mr. Brewster generously turned the speci- 
mens over to me for further study and final disposition, and they were duly 
described by me as Selasphorus alleni in compliment to the man who had first 
brought the species to notice. 
FIELD SEASON OF 1878 
The field season again began at Carson, July 18, and continued till Octo- 
ber 1, when it ended for me at the Dalles on the Columbia. From the Dalles I 
took the steamer down river to Portland, Oregon, and thence to San Francisco, 
