208 Recent Ornithological Publications. 



Chinese names, which the translator has done his best to iden- 

 tify with described species ; but we hope that the good example 

 thus set will induce some other equally profound Sinologue to 

 make us acquainted with the ornithological authors of the 

 Celestial Empire. 



In the ' Proceedings of the Royal Artillery Institution ' of 

 Woolwich for 1865 (vol. iv. pp. 337-339) Mr. Lord publishes a 

 Catalogue of the Bii'ds' Nests and Eggs collected by him when 

 naturalist to the British North American Boundary Commission, 

 to which a few notes are appended. We should be sorry to 

 appear even to covet our neighbour's goods, and it would be 

 ungenerous to grudge anything to the rising Museum at Wool- 

 wich, which is so warmly supported by " The Royal Regiment," 

 and so carefully looked after by its active curator, our corre- 

 spondent, Mr. Whitely; but, as a matter of principle, we think 

 we may fairly object to any specimens collected by a Govern- 

 ment Expedition — as we imagine that of the Boundary Com- 

 mission was — being allowed to go elsewhere than to the National 

 Collection. The eggs of Corvus caurinus Mr. Lord believes he 

 was the first to bring home ; and a rather curious fact is men- 

 tioned by him, that Numenius lungirostris seldom lays more 

 than two eggs. 



A note by Mr. Richard Taylor, communicated to the March 

 number of the ' Annals and Magazine of Natural Histoiy,' has 

 no small interest in its bearing on the extension of the range of 

 species, a subject about which so little is at present known. 

 The author states that a bird has lately made its appearance at 

 Wanganaui in New Zealand, and is now abundant there, doing 

 good service in freeing the fruit-trees from the "American 

 blight.'' A specimen sent to the British Museum proves the 

 " welcome little stranger " to be the Zosterops dorsalis of Gould, 

 Z. ccerulescens (Lath.), hitherto only known as an inhabitant of 

 Tasmania, South Australia, and New South Wales. Mr. Taylor 

 says that " it stays the winter with us, and, we suppose, passes 

 the summer at Taupo." 



