that connect the Orders and Families of Birds. 513 



on this subject, and many copious draughts have been taken 

 from these valuable sources. But, while I have given due 

 credit to every inference which my predecessors have been en- 

 abled to deduce from their own observations, and every affinity 

 which their own judgement and experience have enabled them 

 to point out, I have carefully abstained from adopting implicitly 

 the systematic notions of any individual, or restricting myself 

 to any particular line or mode of arrangement. Devoted to no 

 school of natural science, and carried away by the dictates of 

 no authority however high, no reputation however imposing, 

 I have come to the investigation of my subject, — and I trust I 

 may here be allowed to know myself, — unseduced by the fasci- 

 nations of theory, and unfettered by the trammels of system. 

 Whatever has appeared to me most conspicuous by its own 

 merits, and most conformable to the truth of nature, I have 

 unhesitatingly extracted from every source, in whatever school 

 or country it may have been promulgated, or by whatever 

 systematic views or scientific arguments it may have been sup- 

 ported. Considerable has been the aid for which I am thus 

 indebted to the labours of my predecessors. Besides the valu- 

 able information which I have gleaned from the works of the 

 earlier systematic ornithologists, our own Ray in particular and 

 M. Brisson, much obligation is due on my part* to the clear, 

 cautious, and discerning acumen of M. lUiger ; — much to the 

 commanding views and generalising mind of M. Cuvier ; — 

 much to that scientific sagacity and those enlarged and pene- 

 trating powers of investigation, which have placed M.Vieillot in 

 the highest rank of philosophical inquirers into nature ; — and 



* ] speak here only of professed systematic ornithologists. Were I to enumerate 

 my obhgations to all whose public writings or whose personal friendship have partially 

 contributed to my information, I should be involved in an endless return of gratitude 

 and acknowledgement. 



much 



