408 Recent Ornithological Publications. 



XXXIII. — Notices of Recent Ornithological Publications. 



1. English. 



The long expected work of our great descriptive Anatomist on 

 the Vertebrates has made its appearance*; and in it the class 

 Aves {if , pace Professor Huxley and Mr. Parker^ we may still be- 

 allowed to speak of birds as a " Class'') comes in for a fair share 

 of attention, occupying as it does nearly half the volume. Owing 

 probably to their comparatively speaking uniform type of struc- 

 ture and mode of development, birds hitherto have certainly 

 been neglected by the greatest anatomists, and we rejoice to 

 think that at length the English reader is put in possession of a 

 general treatise on the subject; for since Professor Owen, some 

 thirty years ago, wrote the article "Aves" in Dr. Todd's well- 

 known ' Cyclopsedia of Anatomy/ we can call to mind nothing 

 really worth the name. The high standing of the author of the 

 present work renders it unnecessary for us to say anything to 

 recommend its descriptive part, and we feel it would be out of 

 place here to discuss any of the theories to which reference is 

 more or less fully made by him. If, however, it be permitted 

 to us, we venture, with all respect to Professor Owen, to com- 

 plain that his opinions on the systematic arrangement of birds 

 from an anatomical point of view are not expressed with the 

 degree of clearness we had expected ; for on this subject we had 

 always looked forward to his labours throwing great light. Near 

 the beginning of the volume (pp. 9-12) we find, it is true, an 

 enumeration of " the orders, with their characters and sample 

 families, adopted as most convenient for the purpose of the pre- 

 sent work." These are seven in number, viz. Natatores, Gralla- 

 i^ tores, Rasores, Cantores, Volitores, Scansores, and Raptores ; and 



/ we are further told that "An eighth group of birds has been charac- 



terised under the name Cursores * * ^. This is not, however, a 

 natural order ; some of its exponents have demonstrably closer 

 affinities to other groups of which they are wingless members, 



* On the Anatomy of Vertebrates, Vol. ii. Birds and Mammals. By 

 Richard Owen, F.R.S., Superintendent of the Natural History Depart- 

 ments of the British Museum, Foreign Associate of the Institute of France 

 .S:c. London : ISGf). 8vo. 



