43 Review of the new Continuation 



mann's labours attain perfection, but we do think that the very 

 short-comings of such a magnum opus demand no common treat- 

 ment; and if it be true that none should be the censor of a 

 book who does not feel himself its author^s equal, it is assuredly 

 not for us to throw the first stone. 



To proceed, however, to the subject immediately before us. 

 The twelve volumes of the second edition of the 'Naturge- 

 schichte der Vogel Deutschlands,* as we have said, were com- 

 pleted in 1844; but Naumann did not feel his task was finished. 

 He at once set about a Supplement, of which the first part was 

 published in 1847; and in the succeeding ten years six other 

 portions appeared, ere the hand of death was laid upon their 

 author*. 



The naturalists who have charged themselves with the com- 

 pletion of this Supplement are well known by report to most of 

 our readers. Professor Blasius, already in 1840 the joint 

 author with Count Keyserling of a handy volume on European 

 Vertebrates, published in 1844 an account of his travels in 

 Northern Russia. Besides this, by sundry contributions to 

 various periodicalsf he has shown himself to be eminently fitted 

 for the task, and he is now preparing a second volume of his 

 * Naturgeschichte der Wirbelthiere Deutschlands,' containing the 

 Birds, to the appearance of which we look forward with the highest 

 interest. Dr. Baldamus, formerly the conductor of the now 

 defunct ' Naumannia ' — a magazine which ought to be on the 

 book-shelves of every ornithologist — and at present co-editor 

 with Dr. Cabanis of the equally meritorious ' Journal fiir Orni- 

 thologie,' has in the same manner proved himself a tried soldier 



* The number of distinguished ornithologists of different countries who 

 descended to their graves, full of years as full of honours, within a short 

 space of time from J. F. Naumann's death (15 Aug., 1857) is not a little 

 remarkable. W. Yarkell, 1 Sept., 1856; C. L. Bonaparte, 30 July, 

 1857; C. L. Koch, 23 Aug., 1857 ; M. H. C. Lichtenstein, 2 Sept., 

 1857; C. J. Temminck, 30Jan., 1858; F. A. L. Thienemann,24 June, 

 1858. 



t Among these fugitive pieces we would especially direct attention to 

 his able paper " On the Diversity in the Estimate of the European Ornis, 

 &c.," of which a translation appeared in this Journal for July last (Ibis, 

 1861, p. 292). 



