34 Brown’s Reconnoissance in Southwestern Texas. 
westerly from New Braunfels, where Messrs. Werner and Rick- 
secker made their collection, a few years ago.* It lies in a coun- 
try of hills and * 4 flats,” scantily watered and largely unproduc- 
tive, beyond which timber and general vegetation rapidly dis- 
appear, as the westward-bound traveller nears the desolation of 
the Great Plains. Live-oak grows in scattering groves, the post- 
oak in more compact clusters, and cedar occurs in small “brakes ” 
of some density. There are also, along the creek to which the 
village owes its existence, two or three small oases of deciduous 
trees admixed with vines, no one of them, perhaps, an acre in 
extent. The mesquite, which is so common on the prairies to 
the south and east, is not seen, but is replaced by a small variety 
of live-oak growing in the form of chaparral. Throughout my 
stay in it, the country had a very inhospitable and dreary aspect, 
on account of the almost total lack of grass of any kind ; and by 
its absence the number of the local birds is of course materially 
diminished. 
In presenting a list of the birds observed in this locality. I 
wish to call especial attention to the curious admixture of geo- . 
graphical races found here. Among the species which are sub- 
ject to climatic variation, several are represented by two distinct 
varieties and with them confused and indeterminable intermediate 
forms. In others but one constant form is found. And in a third 
class the bird occurs in a varying, transitional phase of plumage 
which, however, occasionally becomes typical of some described 
race. 
1. Hylocichla unalascae ( Gin .) Ridg. Dwarf Thrush. — Uncom- 
mon resident. Not heard to. sing. Several of my specimens very closely 
approach the variety auduboni. I saw nothing of the eastern pallasi , 
which I have received from Mr. Geo. H. Ragsdale, of Gainesville. 
2. Merula migratoria propinqua, Ridg. Western Robin. — Irreg- 
ularly abundant. 
3. Mimus polyglottus (Linn.) Boie . Mockingbird. — Rare resi- 
dent. 
4. Sialia sialis (Linn.) Haldem. Bluebird. — Comparatively com- 
mon during the winter. All of my specimens were in most beautiful 
plumage. Not one male in a dozen show r ed the slightest brownish edging 
to the feathers of the back. I was particularly struck with this in view of 
the fact that almost every individual in a large series collected in Alabama, 
in the winter of 1878, exhibited more or less of this brownish edging. 
* See Brewster, this Bull., Vol. IV, pp. 75-80 and 91-103. 
