General A T oles. 
1 88 
[July 
range, “east to Fort Laramie,” and without doubt we may add, Western 
Kansas, their extreme eastern limit. 
At the same time and place I saw in the cottonwoods two pairs of 
Mocking Birds (Mimus polyglottus'). From song and action they seemed 
to be nesting, and I was informed by a gentleman who had resided in the 
vicinity several years, that a pair nested and reared their young last 
season; but they were the first “Mockers” he ever noticed there. The 
birds are common summer residents in Eastern Kansas, but their nesting, 
or even occurrence, at so great a height in latitude 39 0 , must be rare and 
exceptional. — N. S. Goss, Topeka, Ka?i. 
A California Bird-wave. — In the spring of 1877 I was collecting birds 
in the neighborhood of Campo, San Diego Co., California. This place 
is about forty-five miles east of San Diego, and near the summit of the 
range, which is there low — about 2500 feet altitude. On April 27 I had 
a very good chance to observe a migration in one particular locality. The 
place seemed to be a birds’ highway. The narrow, brush-covered valley 
had a strip of evergreen oaks running down the middle. It sloped south, 
and a couple of miles below fell into a deep canon crossing it at right angles. 
On each side were low mountains, contracting the valley to less than a 
quarter of a mile in width. A strong west wind was blowing across the 
valley. An almost constant stream of birds was passing northward along 
the windward side of the strip of oaks, keeping close to the tops of the 
brush. 
The weather for several days previous had been cold and' stormy, but 
was now clear and warm, and the migrants seemed disposed to make up 
for lost time. They flew steadily along at a business gait, seldom stop- 
ping to feed, then only hurriedly, making short stops usually of but a 
few seconds and working north all the time. Dendrceca occidentalis 
was perhaps the most numerous, coming by twos and threes, and 
even half a dozen together. The high wind made their flight very erratic, 
and I found it impossible to shoot them on the wing. One lit on the 
ground among some Chipping Sparrows. D. townsendi also was present 
in small numbei s. Hummers of several species were especially abund- 
ant, but none stopped. Among them were some very small Hummers, 
possibly Calypte coslce, but they appeared too small for even this species. 
I fired several times but got none. The balance of the migrants were 
various common birds. 
From memory I should say that a dozen to twenty birds passed each 
minute, and at one point practically all passed over a space of less than 
fifty yards in width. The travelling flight of the Hummers was wavy, 
similar to that of a Woodpecker, and the flight of all the others seemed 
to partake of the same undulatory character, although that might have 
been caused by the high wind. — F. Stephens, San Bernardino , Califor- 
nia. 
