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Show 1878.] MR. A. BOUCARD ON BIRDS FROM COSTA RICA. 41 departure I did not lose a single day, and often I had no repose from morning till night. I could easily have obtained a larger number of specimens; but I did not collect very well-known and common birds which were already well represented in m y collection. I consider Costa Rica one of the worst places for making collections, in consequence of the difficulty of transport, the bad roads, and the great expense which these deficiencies occasion. You must carry every thing with you, live and sleep as you can and where you can, sometimes in the most miserable huts, sometimes in the forest. At first I was not able to find help at any price. A few hunters, willing to work for m e at high pay, made such bad skins that I was obliged to dismiss them. Others to whom I offered good prices for birds in the flesh never came again after I gave them powder and shot. At last, a little before my departure, I met with two good hunters, whom I employed a few days, and did very well with them ; but it was rather too late, the time of m y departure having arrived, and the best season for birds being: over. The classification which I have followed in the following list is that of m y * Catalogus Avium.' Ordo CRYPTURI. Family TINAMID^E. 1. NOTHOCERCUS BONAPARTII, Gray. Tinamus frantzii, Lawr. Native name "Gallina del monte." Only one specimen procured, in May 1877, at Rio Navarro, at the base of the Candelaria Mountains, twelve miles from San Jose. This seems to be a rare species ; the typical specimen of T. frantzii, Lawr., was collected at Cervantes by J. Zeledon. Cervantes is not far from Rio Navarro. Like all Tinamidae, it is found in the dense parts of the forest, where it feeds on insects and seeds. They can be easily detected by the noise they make when scratching the ground in search of food. They go in pairs, repeatedly calling one another. When fearing danger they run with much rapidity. 2. CRYPTURUS BOUCARDI, Scl. The type of this species was from Mexico, and not from Guatemala as stated in Gray's ' Hand-list of Birds.' As well as I can remember, the first specimen (the type of this species) was obtained by me at Piaya Vicente, a small village up the river Papaloapam, the mouth of which is at Alvarado, on the Atlantic, between Vera Cruz and Minatitlan. As far as I know, all specimens of this bird have been obtained in the tropical forests a few hundred feet above the sea-level; hut it is an interesting fact that this species has been obtained also in Guatemala and Costa Rica. |
