I 



HISTORICAL PliEFACE. xix 



completed in ISU by his friend and editor, George Ord. But from this time to 1824, 

 when Bonaparte began to write, the reigning work was still Wilson's, nothing appearing 

 during these years to alter the complexion of American ornithology appreciably. Wil- 

 son's name overshadows nearly the whole epoch, — not that others were not then great, 

 but that ho was so much greater. This author treated about 280 species, giving faithful 

 descriptions of all, and colored illustrations of most of them. There are numerous 

 eilitions of his work, of which the principal are Ord's, 1828-29, in three volumes; 

 Jameson's, 1831, in four; Jardine's, 1832, in three; and Brewer's, 1840, in one; all 

 of these, excepting of course the first one, containing Bonaparte's "American Orni- 

 thology" and other matter foreign to the original " Wilson." In 1814, just as " Wilson" 

 was finished, appeared the history of the memorable expedition under Lewis and Clarke 

 — an expedition which furnished some material to Wilson himself, as witness Lewis' 

 AVoodpecker, Clarke's Crow, and the "Louisiana" Tanager; and more to Ord, who con- 

 tributed to the second edition of " Guthrie's Geography " an article upon ornithology. 

 Ord's prominence in this science, however, rests mainly upon his connection with Wilson's 

 work, as already noted. Near the close of the Wilsonian period, Thomas Say gave us 

 important notices of Western birds, upon the basis of material acquired through Long's 

 Expedition to the Eocky Mountains, the account of which appeared in 1823. In this 

 work. Say described sundry species of birds new to science ; but he was rather an ento- 

 mologist than an ornithologist, and his imprint upon our subject is scarcely to be found 

 outside the volume just named. A noted — some might say rather notorious — character 

 appeared upon the scene during this period, in the person of C. S. Rafinesque, who seems 

 to have been a genius, but one so awry that it is difiicult to do aught else than mis- 

 Tinderstand him, unless we confess that we scarcely understand him at all. In the 

 elegant vernacular of the present day he would be called a crank ; but I presume that 

 term means that kind of genius which fails of interpretation ; for an unsuccessful genius 

 is a crank, and a successful crank is a genius. For the rest, the Wilsonian period was 

 marked by great activity in Arctic exploration, in connection with the ornithological 

 results of which appear prominently the names of William E. Leach and Edward 

 Sabine. 



As illustrating the relation between Wilson and Bartram, which I have already 

 pointedly mentioned, I may quote a few lines from Ord's "Life of Wilson."-^ 



1 " His school-house and residence being but a short distance from Bartram's Botanic Garden, situated on 

 the west bank of the Schuylkill : a sequestered s[)ot, possessing attractions of no ordinary kind ; an acquaintance 

 was soon contracted with that venerable naturalist, Mr. William Bartram, which grew into an uncommon friend- 

 ship, and continued without the least abatement until severed by death. Here it was that Wilson found him- 

 self translated, if we may so speak, into a new existence. He had long been a lover of the works of Nature, aud 

 liad derived more happiness from the contemplation of her simple beauties, than from any other source of gratifi- 

 cation. But he had hitherto been a mere novice ; he was now about to receive instructions from one whom the 

 experiences of a long life, spent in travel and rural retirement, had rendered qualified to teach. Mr. Bartram 

 soon perceived the bent of his friend's mind, and its congeniality to his own; and took every pains to encourage 

 him in a study, which, while it expands the faculties, aud purifies the heart, insensibly leads to the contemplation 

 of the glorious Author of Nature himself. From his youth W^ilsoii had been an observer of the manners of birds; 

 and since his arrival in America he had found them objects of uncommon interest; but he had not yet viewed 

 them with the eye of a naturalist." 



This was about 1800 —rather a little later. Wilson's " novitiate " was the Vieillotian period, almost exactly. 

 Bartram survived till July 22, 1823, his eighty-fourth year; the date of his death thus coinciding very nearly with 

 the close of the Wilsonian epoch aud period. 



