Notes, Reviews and Comments. 113 



interest that would otherwise have been felt in their living relatives . 

 On the otherhand, an illusive song, a few unsatisfying glimpses through 

 the leaves, or over the distant tree-tops can awaken a keenness of hunt- 

 ing instinct that, following its object through thicket and marsh and 

 stumbling over two or three false identifications, will end in a knowledge, 

 born of deep friendship between man and bird, that can be come at in 

 no other way. Such a plan may be too. slow for this end of the 

 century, but its results have a sta) ing-power about them 

 Afterwards when inspecting the museum specimens, the student 

 will know what points he should study most carefully ; and whenever 

 that song is heard again the leaves grow greener and the air fresher 

 and other things come back to mind that to miss would be loss indeed. 

 Among the most valuable features in the book are the Keys. They 

 are not, as is too often the case with natural history keys, so extremely 

 analytic and complicated that the student can only establish the iden- 

 tity of the specimen at the risk of losing his own. '! here is a short 

 systematic Key to the Orders and Families, and under each family a Key 

 to the Species. In the latter all systematic arrangement, in the 

 scientific sense, is abandoned. The author's motto is: If the Keys wil' 

 identify they will have accomplished their purpose . For example, the 

 Finch family is divided into three groups : 

 I . Under parts with red . 

 II . Under parts with no red and without distinct streaks. 

 Ill . Under parts without red and with numerous streaks. 

 Each of these groups is again divided by other prominent color 

 markings, until at the third sub-division the several species are reached . 

 This plan will be found an excellent one for field identification, and by 

 checking results with the accurate descriptions in the body of the work, 

 all dangei of error may be avoided . For some cf the larger families, 

 as the Finches and the Warbles, there is also a Field Key to the Adult 

 Males in Breeding Plumage. 



Though not too large to be carried in the pecket, the work is a gem 

 of the art of bookmaking. In addition to upwards of ioo cuts of bills, 

 feet, etc., scattered through the text, there is a colored frontispiece, 

 "Bob-white," a Color Chart, and 18 full page plates in "half- 



