680 Recently published Ornitholoyical PVorks. 



which the county may be divided, namely the central plain, 

 the hill country of the east, and the Wirral peninsula and 

 marshes of the Dec, are well described ; and in spite of the 

 spread of population on the Lancashire side, coupled with the 

 inevitable reclamation of marsh-land, it is clear that plenty 

 of wild country is still left for the ornithologist in Cheshire. 

 In number of species the county is not very rich — only 222 ; 

 but these are all genuine, and there has been no attempt to 

 swell the list. The fact is that Cheshire lies too far to the 

 west for some migrants, while it is yet a little too far east 

 for the inferior line of passage which passes down the west 

 coast of Great Britain and crosses the Irish Sea by Wigton- 

 shire, Anglesea, and the Isle of Man. The illustrations are 

 pretty, the bibliography forms a good feature, and the iuHex 

 is copious ; but the map is hardly up to the standard of the 

 rest of the book. 



108. De Kay's' Bird-Gods.' 



[Bird-Gods by Charles de Kay. With an Accompaniment of Decora- 

 tions by George Wharton Edwards. London : Harry R. Allenson. 

 1 vol. 8vo. 250 pp.] 



We have received a copy of this curious book with a 

 request that it may be noticed in ' The Ibis.' It is difficult 

 to pick out the thread of the author's ideas from his 

 remarks, for these wander into all sorts of subjects that 

 are quite unfamiliar to plain ornithologists. Perhaps the 

 subjoined extract from the preface will serve to explain 

 the purport of the volume : — 



" I follow in mythology and epic poetry and legends the 

 traces of certain birds, the Eagle, the Swan, the Wood- 

 pecker, the Cuckoo, the Owl, the Peacock, the Dove, and 

 try to show how their peculiarities and habits, observed by 

 primitive man with the keenness of savages, have laid the 

 foundation for certain elements in various religions and 

 mythologies, and sometimes furnished, through the peculi- 

 arities of the creature's habits or character, the skeleton plots 

 on which a host of legends and tragedies has been built by 

 the imagination of poet-priests and poet-historians of the 

 early days." 



