THE CONDOR 
I Vol. [V 
5f> 
THE CONDOR. 
Bulletin of the 
CooPKR Ornithological Club 
OF CALIFORNIA. 
Published bi-nionthly at Santa Clara, Cal., in the interests 
and as Official Organ of the Club. 
CHPISTER BARLOW, - - Santa Clara, Cal., 
F.ditor and Business Manager. 
M'ALTER K. FISHER, Stanford University Cal. 
HOW.A.RD ROBERTSON, Box 55, Sta. Los Angeles. 
Associates. 
Subscription, (in advance) - - One Dollar a Year. 
Single Copies, ------- 25 Cents. 
Si.x Copies or more of one issue, - 12 % Cents Each. 
Foreign Subscription, $i 25. 
Free to Honoraiy Members and to Active Members not 
in arrears for dues. 
.\dvertising rates will be sent on application. 
Advertisements and subscriptions should be sent to the 
Business Managers. 
Exchanges should be sent to the Editor-in-Chief. 
Entered at the Santa Clara Post-office as second class 
matter. 
This issue of The Condor was mailed Mar. 15" 
EDITORIAL 
Our contemporary, The Osprey, begins tlie 
new year with a new series. The January issue 
presents a change of cover paper while laid 
paper is used of the inside, giving a pleasing 
result. An excellent monograph of the Cali- 
fornia jay by Donald -A. Cohen constitutes the 
opening article. 
The editors present their thanks to Mr. Rich- 
ard C. McGregor for his careful preparation 
of the index to Volume III which is mailed 
with this issue. 
Readers of this magazine will observe that 
almost the entire space of the issue is given 
over to text. The problem of a large ciuantity 
of MS. has necessitated the omission of a num- 
ber of half-tones intended for this issue, but 
these will appear in the May Condor Among 
the illustrated articles laid over is one by Wm. 
L. Finley on “Seabirds of the Oregon Coast", 
accompanied by several of Mr, Bohlman’s 
superb bird photographs. 
CORRESPONDENCE. 
A LETTER FROM THE GALAP.AGOS EX- 
PEDITION. 
Lat. 16° 40', Long 104° 15'. 
January i, 1902. 
Editor The Condor: 
A resolution formed this morning (the cus- 
tomary day for new resolutions) was to the effect 
that a nice, rambling, disconnected letter to 
you would be the proper form. (Digression: 
Have just spent one-half hour getting a small 
tern, a new one to us, that flew about in com- 
pany of another, the former being the first of 
its kind we have seen). To begin, the weather 
is a fertile topic, we having had lovely weather 
for steamboats but for our sailing vessel a trifle 
too calm. 
We are 240 miles west of Acapulco, Mexico, 
where we are bound with two men from Clip- 
perton Island. Yesterday we made 16 miles 
N. W., the day before 9 miles N E., and the 
tw'o preceding days 100 miles each east, so 
you see it is about as uncertain as it is collect- 
ing eagles’ eggs at Sargents. We thought 
four days ago that we might be at -Acapulco by 
New Years; now we hope to get there in the 
sweet bye and bye. From there we go to 
Cocos, probably, and thence to the Galapagos. 
-After leaving Mexico we expect a fair wind to 
Cocos. 
The evenings and mornings are glorious out 
here, bright, delicately-tinted clouds at sunset 
and daybreak that completely eclipse similar 
sea-scapes in California. The birds that occur 
off here are several in variety. The other 
morning, my watch from 4 to 8, the first seen 
was a single shearwater from Socorro, then a 
petrel flitted by. Next was a young Brewster 
booby that circled about and flew off to join 
some blue-faced boobies in the distance. -A 
red-billed tropic bird appeared for a few min- 
utes and later in the day a frigate bird showed 
in the sky. These are our usual visitors. 
Around Clipperton Aestrelata phoepygia was 
frequently .seen and the sooty terns wander 
hundred of miles from the island. The blue- 
faced boobies found at sea at this season are 
all young birds, that is, ten or eleven months 
old. Nearly all that we have seen at sea for 
the last three weeks have been in this plum- 
age. Within 40 miles of Clipperton adult 
boobies were common, and of the thousands 
of blue-faced boobies seen on the island but 
one was seen in the spotted plumage. 
Clipperton Island! How I’d like to spend 
the month of January there with a good 8xto 
camera. The family life of three or four 
species of birds could be pretty well photo- 
graphed in that time. Of the blue-faced 
boobies {Snla cyanops) one can get a picture of 
one or a hundred or a thousand. Their tame- 
ness is occasionally decidedly annoying when 
one happens to be in a hurry aud the nests are 
close together. It is advisable always to walk 
not closer than two feet form a sitting bird. 
With nests scattered around promiscuously it 
is a regular zigzag trail one makes. Sula nes- 
iotes which is abundant also, does not nest till 
later though pairs of birds are holding down 
nesting sites and an occasional young bird 
unable to fly is noted. 
But the land crabs! Why, there are millions 
