XXXIV 
THE BIRDS OF LIBERIA 
By Guover M. ALLEN 
INTRODUCTION 
Previous to the classical investigations of Bittikofer and his associates, the 
natural history of Liberia had been very little studied and practically no col- 
lections of birds made. Apparently Robert MacDowell, a United States 
Consul to Sierra Leone, was the first to collect birds in that country, for, ac- 
cording to Biittikofer, he secured a number of birds on the St. Paul’s River 
about 1840. A specimen of Coracina azurea which he sent to Cassin was de- 
scribed by the latter in 1851, from a bird which though not specifically so stated, 
is assumed by Biittikofer to have been taken in Liberia, for which it is the 
only record. From 1875 to 1877, the German traveller, Schweitzer, procured a 
number of birds, mammals, insects, and mollusks in the neighborhood of Mon- 
rovia, and these were sent to Dr. H. Dohrn of the museum at Stettin, Germany. 
Unfortunately Schweitzer died shortly after his return home as a result of 
sickness contracted during his stay in the tropics. In 1879 came to fruition 
the plan of Dr. Hermann Schlegel, Director of the Royal Museum at Leyden, 
to send an expedition to Liberia to investigate its fauna. To carry out this 
work he dispatched J. Buttikofer and Carl F. Sala to the West Coast, where 
for two and a half years, they collected in so thorough a manner that very 
little has since been added to the list of Liberian birds and mammals. Sala 
died of fever in 1881, but Buttikofer returned to Europe with somewhat im- 
paired health. Two years afterward, feeling still unfitted to make another 
journey to the tropics, he sent at his own expense, his old hunting companion, 
F. X. Stampfli, to carry on the work so well begun in Liberia. From May, 1884, 
till the spring of 1886, Stampfli made collections chiefly on the Junk and Mes- 
urado rivers, supplementing the explorations of Bittikofer and Sala who 
had largely worked at Grand Cape Mount and on the St. Paul’s River. In 
November, 1886, in company with Stampfli, Biittikofer returned to Liberia 
to continue his investigations for a few months, making excursions to various 
points along the coast, and up some of the larger rivers for a short distance. 
Stampfli remained for a few weeks longer to explore the lower course of the 
Farmington River, and later returned to Europe. The work done by Biitti- 
kofer and his associates, including a native collector, A. T. Demery (who con- 
tinued to send birds, making one journey of several days’ travel up the Marfa 
River), forms the basis of our knowledge of Liberian natural history, more 
particularly of its birds and mammals. Since his day but little collecting has 
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