PREFACE. iii 



grations, natural affinities, and other circumstances, are also 

 described ; and, when occasions are offered, critical and ex- 

 planatory remarks respecting families, genera, and species, are 

 introduced. Many of the details are illustrated by figures en- 

 graved on wood and steel, from drawings made by myself, — 

 the former executed by Messrs. Sclater and Son, the latter by 

 Mr. Gellatly. 



Some anatomical details are introduced as absolutely neces- 

 sary to be known before any real knowledge of the relations of 

 the species can be obtained. The entire series of the digestive 

 apparatus, comprehending the bill, the tongue, the throat, the 

 gullet, the crop, the proventriculus, the stomach or gizzard, 

 the intestine, and its coecal appendages, has been described in 

 all cases, excepting those in which it was found impossible to 

 procure recent specimens. The physiology of these organs 

 forms a most convenient centre of relations, affording, as it 

 were, a key to the more intelligible functions, and determining 

 the food, the haunts, the flight, the mode of walking, and other 

 actions of the bird. It also throws much light upon the affini- 

 ties of groups, and tends to prevent the frequently absurd asso- 

 ciations imagined by persons who form systems by arranging 

 birds"* skins on their parlour floors. All the primary groups of 

 birds may be readily determined by a little attention to tlio 

 nature of the digestive organs, as may be seen on comparing the 

 details given in the following pages with their illustrations. 



As the actions and various relations of the species cannot be 

 properly understood without reference to the nature of the dis- 

 tricts which they inhabit, I have considered it useful occasion- 

 ally to introduce descriptive sketches of scenery. Although 

 in all cases I have been anxious to copy nature with scrupulous 

 fidelity, I have not considered a mysterious gravity or an as- 

 sumed dignity in any degree tending to benefit my readers. 

 A pompous ornithologist is of all characters one of the most 

 absurd ; and the solemnity of scientific pride sits ill upon 

 him who is alternately scaling precipices and wading bogs, 

 chasing the ptarmigan on the weather-beaten summits of 

 the Highland hills, and pursuing the flights of plovers along 

 the sandy shores of our bays and estuaries. The man who 



