No. S. — A Collection of Birds from Can a, Darien By Ludlow Griscom It will not have been forgotten that m 1912 Major E. A. Goldman collected extensively in eastern Panama in various parts of the Rio Tuyra basin and, using Cana as a base, successfully ascended Mt. Pirri, and maintained a camp in the cloud forest for several weeks. Most unfortunately this collection has ne^•er been reported upon, but a re-markable number of new genera, species and subspecies were described by Dr. Nelson, unquestionably constituting the richest haul of novelties ever made by a single expedition anywhere in Central America in mod-ern times. Three years later the American Museum collectors, An-thony, Richardson and Ball, made extensive collections in the Tuyra valley, and succeeded in reaching the subtropical zone on Mt. Tacar-cuna, well to the north of Mt. Pirri. Here other novelties were secured, as well as some of the specialties of Mt. Pirri, but a rather surprising number of the latter were not found. The marked differences in the avifauna of the two mountains, and the absence from both collections of many subtropical genera common to South and Central America is evidence to my way of thinking that the surface has been scratched only and that this zone in eastern Panama will repay investigation for years to come. The situation has been exactly the same in the tropical zone, as two recent expeditions have brought back birds new to science and others new to Panama, in spite of the thousands of specimens brought back from the same general region by some of the most com-petent collectors in the world. Major Goldman's comment (Mammals of Panama, p. 14) that the fauna of the region, especially the birds, seemed inexhaustible, has been amply justified. The collection of birds reported in this article was made in the spring and summer of 1928 by Mr. Rex R. Benson, who has been working in various parts of Panama, with conspicuous success, in the interests of the American Museum of Natural History. The reopening of the his-toric gold mines at Cana, which were abandoned shortly after Gold-man's visit, made a trip to the Mt. Pirri district possible for the first time in years. Dr. Chapman's interest being primarily the cloud forest birds, he agreed to let this Museum buy the other collections and with unexampled generosity permitted us to describe and keep any novelties or Parities they might contain. Our best thanks are therefore due him, and to Dr. Barbour for purchasing it. I greatly appreciate the
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