XIV. INTRODUCTION. 



and Lugg, where there was greater freedom from ice. Numbers of 

 Ducks, Wigeon, Teal, and Geese appeared on the Wye, where 

 they are now less disturbed than they were in former days, before 

 the railway traffic had superseded the barges. 



It remains to notice the papers, etc., that have already 

 appeared upon the Birds of Herefordshire. In the year 1851 a 

 very well-written, and interesting little book, was published by 

 a Herefordshire Naturalist. It is entitled " The Songs of the 

 Birds ; or, Analogies of Animal and Spiritual Life," by the Rev. 

 W. E. Evans, M.A., who afterwards became one of the Canons 

 Residentiary of Hereford Cathedral. Mr. Evans lived at Burton 

 Court, in the centre of the county, when the work was published. 

 He was a close observer of nature, and since his work has been 

 long out of print, many quotations will be given from it, in prose 

 and verse, for both are equally good, and founded on local 

 observations in Herefordshire. Quotations from poetry will be 

 very freely given in this work, — feathers to float more pleasantly the 

 dry carcase of scientific names. 



Several interesting papers, with local lists of Herefordshire 

 Birds, have already been published in the Transactions of the 

 Woolhope Club ; viz., " On the Animals and Birds of Hereford- 

 shire," by Mr. R. M. Lingwood (Trans., No. 4, 1862, pp. 32-6); 

 "On the Flight of Birds," by Mr. James Rankin, M.A., M.R 

 (Trans., 1868, pp. 48-59); "On the Rare Birds of Herefordshire," 

 by Mr. Arthur Armitage and the Rev. Clement Ley (Trans., 1869, 

 PP- 71-7)^ "On the Rare Birds of Herefordshire and Radnor- 

 shire," by Mr. James W. Lloyd (Trans., 1869, pp. 78-80); "List 

 of Birds observed at Bredwardine," by the Rev. Robert Blight 

 (Trans., 1869, pp. 158-9); "List of Birds observed at Lingen," 

 by the Rev. C. H. Middleton (Trans., 1873, p. 88); with many 

 ornithological notices scattered through the volumes. It is pro- 

 posed now to unite all these observations in one general list for 

 the whole county. 



The classification followed in these pages is that proposed by 

 Professor Huxley, and adopted, with some shght modification, 



