BOOK NOTICES 119 



of a ready writer, and her descriptions of the people of Siberia, their 

 dwellings, habits and life generally are excellent, and are greatly 

 enhanced by the many photographs which adorn the book. The return 

 journey by the Kara Sea was full of adventure and, to our thinking, the 

 finest bit of description is the account of the adventurous passage 

 through the fields of ice-pack. A great part of the interest of the book 

 lies in the fact that all the information is first hand. The author has 

 succeeded in catching some of the charm of these far northern lands, and 

 when describing the birds she loves so well, brings before our eyes many 

 fascinating pictures of the illimitable solitudes in which they spend their 

 brief summer. The book is one which will make every ornithologist 

 long to visit the Tundras and see the marvels of its bird life. 



A List of British Birds, published by the British Ornithologists' Union. 

 Second and revised edition. London, 1915. Price 7s. 6d. 



The British Ornithologists' Union has now issued the second edition 

 of its List of British Birds, upon which a special committee of the 

 members has been engaged since 191 1. In the present divided state of 

 opinion regarding nomenclature and classification it is impossible that 

 the list can escape criticism ; but, of the two schools, the " progressives " 

 should have least cause to find fault. With the exception of a dozen 

 generic and specific " nomina conservanda," the names employed in the 

 list have been arrived at by the application of the principle of priority, 

 with 1758 — the date of the loth edition of Linneeus' Systema Naturce — as 

 the starting point. The reason for several of the "nomina conservanda" 

 is the desire to avoid the confusion caused by a transference of long- 

 established names to other species — a point the practical importance of 

 which will, to the mind of most people, appear decisive. One is glad 

 to see boschas retained as the specific name of the Wild Duck, for it has 

 yet to be proved K\\.2X platyrhynchos was the female of this species and not 

 of the Shoveler, as Linnzeus himself stated it was — the very name argues 

 that he was right. The retention of ochropus, as opposed to ocrophus, 

 for the Green Sandpiper ought also to be approved. Trinomials 

 are used in the list, but only for subspecies or races other than the 

 typical forms, to which the binomial species-names are restricted, the 

 object being to avoid the use of such cumbrous designations as Ttirdus 

 musicus musicus, Coccothraiistes coccothraustes coccothraustes, etc. How- 

 ever much one must sympathise with the desire to evade these inflictions, 

 there seems no escape from them if the use of trinomials be sanctioned 

 at all. To restrict the binomial to a section only of the aggregate species 

 is not logical. As regards the classification, the committee has adopted 

 that used by Dr Sharpe in his Hand-list of Birds^ but the sequence of the 

 Families and Orders has been reversed, so that the list begins with the 

 Crows and ends with the Grouse, the Raven and the Ptarmigan 

 occupying respectively the highest and the lowest places. In the 

 circumstances, and on the score of convenience, there is a great deal to 



