y[ PllEFACE. 



across to the Pacific Coast, and that of John K. Townseud and Mr. Nuttall, 

 both of whom made some collections and brought back notices of the coun- 

 try, which, however, tliey were unable to explore to any great extent. The 

 entire region of Texas, New llexico, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, and Cali- 

 fornia was unvisited, as also a great portion of territory north of the United 

 States boundary, including British Columbia and Alaska. 



A work by Sir John Richardson, forming a volume in his series of " Fauna 

 Boreali-Americana," in reference to the ornithology of the region covered by 

 the Hudson Bay Company's operation;?, . was published in 1831, and has 

 been nnuli used by Mr Audubon, but embraces little or nothing of the great 

 breeding-grounds of the water birds in the neighborhood of the Great Slave 

 and Bear Lakes, the Upper Yukon, and the shores of the Arctic coast. 



It will tluis be seen that a tliird of a century has elajjsed since any at- 

 tempt has been made to jjresent a systematic history of the birds of North 

 America. 



The object of the present work is to give, in as concise a I'orm as possible, 

 an account of what is known of the birds, not only of the United States, but 

 of the whole region of North America north of the boundary-line of Mexico, 

 including Greenland, on the one side, and Alaska with its islands on tlie 

 other. Tlie published materials for such a history are so copious that it is a 

 matter of surprise that they have not been sooner utilized, consisting, as they 

 do, of numerous scattered biographies and re])orts of nuiny government expe- 

 ditions and ])rivate explorations. ]5ut the; most productive source has been 

 the great amount of manuscri|>t contained in the arcliives of the Smithsonian 

 Institution in the form of corresjiondcnce, elaborate reports, and the field- 

 notes of collectors and travellers, the use of which, fur the jiresent work, has 

 been liberally allowed by Professor Henry. By far the most important of 

 these consist of notes made by the late liobert Kennicott in Britisli America, 

 and received from him and otlier gentlemen in the Hudson Bay Territory, 

 who were brought into intimate relationship with the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion through Mr. Kennicott's efforts. Among them may be mentioned more 

 especially Mr. R. MacFarlane, Mr. B. R. Ross, Mr. James Lockhart, Mr. 

 Lawrence Clark, Mr. Strachan Jones, and others, whose names will appear 

 in the cour.se of the work. The especial value of the communications re- 

 ceived from these gentlemen lies in the fact that they resided for a long 

 time in a region to which a large proportion of the rapacioiis and water birds 

 of North America resort during the summer for inculiation, and whicli until 

 recently has been sealed to explorers. 



Equally serviceable has been the information received from the region of 

 the Yukon River and Alaska generally, including tlie Aleutian Islands, as 

 supplied by Messrs. Robert Kennicott, \Villuun H. Dall, Henry M. Bannister, 

 Henry W. Elliott, and others. 



It should be understood that the remarks as to the absence of general works 

 on American Ornithology, since the time of Audubon, apply only to the life 



