i82 Mr. Vigors's Sketches in Ornithologt/. 



that the difference of Created Beings must consist in the mode of 

 their reception of this Intelligence; as modified in Principles like 

 those of Instinct, Sensation, and Power of Organization ;— and 

 with respect to Man, as modified in the Powers of Rationality. — • 

 Man alone appears to receive it in freedom. 



Art. XX. Sketches in Ornithology/ ; or Observations ott 

 the leading Affinities of some of the more extensive groups 

 of Birds. By N. A. Vigors,^?//?. Esq. AM. F.L.S. 



[Continued from p. 70.] 

 ON THE GENUS ICTERUS, BrtSS. 



When we consider the comprehensive nature of the views by 

 which Linnaeus was guided in his arrangement of Ornithology^ 

 and the limited information that existed respecting the habits and 

 manners of the extra-European forms which were known to his 

 times, we ought not to feel surprise, but rather should conceive it 

 to be the necessary result of his undertaking, were we to find 

 that many subordinate errours had crept into his primary divi- 

 sions, with regard to the affinities of the species which composed 

 them. In an infant state of science an analogical resemblance 

 may easily be mistaken for an indication of affinity ; and many 

 species may thus be at first sight admitted into the same group, 

 in consequence of a partial similarity of character, which may 

 afterwards be discovered, by the prevalence of some less conspi- 

 cuous but still essential peculiarities, to occupy different stations 

 in nature. Every day*s observation, even in the present compa- 

 ratively advanced state of Ornithology, convinces us of this fact. 

 Such errours however, although we might reasonably be prepared 

 to meet with them, are seldom observable in the works of Lin- 

 naeus, So eminent was the insight of that great man into natural 

 affinities, that, with one or two exceptions, his leading divisions 

 have stood the test of examination ; and modern science, with 

 all its superiour advantages of experience and observation, has 



