1884.] 



BEVIEWS OF BOOKS. 



449 



Sketches of Bird Life, from Twenty Years' Observation of Their 

 Haunts and Habits. By James Edmund Harting, Author of 

 'A Handbook of British Birds,' &c. London: W. H. Allen 

 and Co. 



^HESE sketches, the author assures us, have all been written from 

 his personal observation, during many years, of birds in their 

 natural haunts. His descriptions are embellished by the drawings 

 of Mr. Charles Wliymper, and the two have produced a most charniino- 

 volume. We have delightful chapters on the kestrel, the short-eared 

 owl, the thrush, the blackbird, the fieldfare, the robin, the nightingale, 

 the blackcap, the garden warbler, the whitethroat, the several species 

 of titmouse, the golden-crested wren, the siskin, the brambling, the 

 chaffinch and goldfinch and bullfinch, the sparrow, the jay, the cuckoo, 

 the hoopoe, the plover, the lapwing, the woodcock, the ruff and reeve, 

 the curlew, the heron, the teal, and the herring gull. 



Who that loves the country ever tires of country subjects ? and 

 what more congenial subject for pleasant gossip can there be than the 

 birds ? * No matter what the time of year or place in which we take 

 a country ramble,' says the author, ' some feathered favourite, we may 

 be sure, will greet us with welcome note, or arrest our attention by 

 some peculiarity of habit.' 



We cannot speak too highly of Mr. Whymper's delightful sketches, 

 charmingly produced, and admirably printed ; and we should like, 

 did space permit, to take many extracts from the interesting text of 

 Mr. Harting, but we must be content with one. Touching current 

 opinions as to the laying of the cuckoo, the author says : — 



