Recently pul/lished OrnithoJoyicat JVorks. 553 



twelve pag-es, accompanied hx illustrations of the birds and 

 plants, 



85. Rear ton on British Breeditiy Birds. 



[Our Rarer British Birds, their Nests, Eggs, aud Summer Haunts. 

 B\^ Richard Kearton. Illustrated by Photographs by 0. Kearton. 8vo. 

 Cassell & Co.] 



We can thoroughly recommend this little book (some 160 

 pages in all) for the beauty of its photogravures aud the 

 accuracy of its letterpress. Few naturalists have travelled 

 so widely in the British Islands aud taken so much pains to 

 obtain good jjhotographs as these two enterprising brothers. 

 Some species are included which are not, strictly speaking, 

 " rare/^ but the reason is that good examples of their nests 

 were not available in 1895^ when the work on ' British Birds' 

 Nests ' was published, to which this is a supplement ; no one, 

 however, will deny that epithet to the Kite, Osprey, Marsh- 

 and Montagu's Harriers, Buzzard, and Great Skua, while 

 Fulmars, Fork-tailed Petrels, and Red-necked Phalaropes 

 have not often been photographed '' at home.^' Mr. Kearton's 

 remarks on the protection of our rarer species are eminently 

 characterized by sense, as distinguished from sentiment. 



86. Mercerat on the Stereornithes. 



[Sur les Stereornithes. Par A. Merceri<t. Comuuicacioues del Mus. 

 Nac. de Buenos Aires, tome i. p. 161 (1899).] 



In this notice the author protests against certain opinions 

 which he states have been attributed to him by Dr. Andreae 

 in a review (Neues Jahrbuch f. Min., Geol. u. Paleont. 1899, ii. 

 pp. 322-330), and in which several inaccuracies occur. He 

 further remarks that he regards the Stereornithes as a "gens" 

 of the Order Pelargornithes of Fiirbringer^ and that they 

 are related to the suborder Ciconiiformes as the Gastornithes 

 are related to the An^eriformes : moreover, he expresses 

 himself strongly in favour of the polyphyletic origin of the 

 Ratitse. In his remarks on a paper by Andrews published 

 in this Journal (Ibis, 1896, p. 1), the opinion of that author, 



