100 Recent 1 1/ published Ornitholoyical Works. 



9. Coues's neiv Key to North-American Birds. 



[Key to North-American Birds. Containing a concise account of every 

 species of living and fossil bird at present known from the Continent 

 north of the Mexican and United States Boundary, inclusive of Greenland. 

 Second edition, revised to date, and entirely rewritten : with which are 

 incorporated General Ornithology, an outline of the Structure and Clas- 

 sification of Birds ; and Field Ornithology, a Manual of collecting, pre- 

 paring, and preserving Birds. By Elliott Coues, M.A. Royal 8vo. 

 London and Boston : 1884.] 



The first edition of Dr. Coues's well-kuown ^Key to North- 

 American Birds' was issued in 1872. The twelve years that 

 have since elapsed have^ as we all know, been a period of 

 great activity to the American ornithologists^ and have so 

 greatly increased our knowledge of the Nearctic avifauna, 

 that it was quite necessary that the ' Key ' should be revised. 

 The revised, improved, and augmented 'Key' forms the 

 second and third part of the present edition. To the main 

 body of the work thus constituted, Dr. Coues has prefixed a 

 reprint of his ' Field Ornithology,' which originally appeared 

 in 1874 as a separate work, and is, we believe, one of the best 

 manuals of instruction for the field-collector, as regards 

 the obtaining, preparing, and preserving specimens, ever put 

 together. He has likewise added, as Part IV., a systematic 

 Synopsis of the Fossil Birds of North America — in the re- 

 vision of which he has had the advantage of the assistance 

 of Prof. O. C. Marsh, the greatest living authority on this 

 subject. 



It is, however, to Part II. of the present volume that we 

 must specially direct the reader's attention. In this Part there 

 is condensed into some 180 pages a more complete account of 

 the structure and classification of birds, brought up to the 

 present standard of our knowledge, than any other with 

 which we are acquainted. After defining and describing what 

 birds in general are, and stating the principles and practices 

 used in classification, special chapters are devoted to their ex- 

 ternal structure, " osteology, neurology, angeiology, pneuma- 

 tology, splanchnology, and oology." So much information 

 that cannot be got at elsewhere is brought together in this 

 comprehensive treatise, that it ought to be in the hands of 



