INTRODUCTION. V 



reference to their lists or catalogues, but which are neglected by 

 their over-zealous editor, and the new names are launched out 

 to swell the list still farther. Other equally exact observers 

 labour and examine so far as their opportunities admit, but very 

 few possess either the libraries or collections to illustrate even 

 any one branch of Zoology or Botany : it is true that these hin- 

 drances are diminishing every day, and from the ease and small 

 expense with which queries regarding any unknown or disputed 

 species can be circulated, there is scarcely an excuse now for any 

 one remaining in ignorance of anything that may come into his 

 possession; and the alternative of either giving a new name, or 

 leaving it blank to be filled up by some other observer, is there- 

 fore taken away. 



From these causes, and a few others incident to them, orni- 

 thological synonymy, both generic and specific, has reached a 

 bewildering extent. The generic names at present employed, 

 according to the list prepared for the British Museum by Mr. 

 George Robert Gray during this year (1855), reaches to no 

 less a number than 2403 (which, so far as we know the number 

 of birds already discovered, would allow somewhat less than 

 three species to each genus), and to these has to be added their 

 synonymy, reaching from one to ten for each genus*. The extent 

 of the specific synonymy cannot be ascertained or enumerated. 

 Any work, then, undertaken with care and judgment, and with 

 an adequate knowledge of the subject, that will unravel this 

 synonymy, must be of the utmost importance not only to the 

 student of ornithology, but to any one who is working without 

 the means of access to a complete library or an extensive collec- 

 tion ; and there cannot be any doubt that the large mass of mate- 

 rials which it is now our object to publish, will, when arranged 

 and completed, assist materially in supplying this want. 



Among the various branches of Natural Science pursued by 

 Hugh E. Strickland, next to Geology, that of Ornithology occu- 

 pied the greatest portion of his attention, and was actively pi-o- 

 secuted at an early period of his life. During his travels on the 



* A List of Genera and Subgenera of Birds, by George Robert Gray. London, 

 1855. Since the publication of the above, we perceive in some recent works 

 several additional genera have been contrived, so that the nuiubers quoted ai-e 

 alreadv under the amount. 



