10 DICTIONARY OF BIRDS 



Unfortunately he was too soon in the field to avail himself, even had he 

 been so minded, of the convenient mode of nomenclature brought into 

 use by Linnaeus, and it is only in the last two volumes of Brisson's 

 Ornithologie that any reference is made to the tenth edition of the Systema 

 Naturae, in which the binomial method was introduced. It is certain 

 that the first four volumes were written if not printed before that method 

 was promulgated, and when the fame of Linnaeus as a zoologist rested on 

 little more than the very meagre sixth edition of the Systema Naturm and 

 the first edition of his Fauna Suecica. Brisson has been charged with 

 jealousy of, if not hostility to, the great Swede, and it is true that in the 

 preface to his Ornithologie he complains of the insufficiency of the Linnsean 

 characters, but, when one considers his much better acquaintance with 

 Birds, such criticism must be allowed to be pardonable if not wholly 

 just. This work was in French, with a parallel translation in Latin, 

 which last (edited, it is said, by Pallas) was reprinted separately at Leyden 

 three years afterwards. 



In 1767 there was issued at Paris a book entitled L'histoire naturelle 

 e'claircie dans une de ses parties principales, V Ornithologie. This was the 

 work of Salerne, published after his death, and is often spoken of as being 

 a mere translation of Ray's Synopsis, but is thereby very inadequately 

 described, for, though it is confessedly founded on that little book, a vast 

 amount of fresh matter, and mostly of good quality, is added. 



The success of Edwards's work seems to have provoked competition, 

 and in 1765, at the instigation of Buffon, the younger D'Aubentou began 

 the publication known as the Planches Enlumin^ez d'histoire naturelle, 

 which appearing in forty -two parts was not completed till 1780, when the 

 plates ^ it contained reached the number of 1008 — all coloured, as its title 

 intimates, and nearly all representing Birds. This enormous work was 

 subsidized by the French Government ; and, though the figures are devoid 

 of artistic merit, they display the species they are intended to depict 

 with sufficient approach to fidelity to ensure recognition in most cases 

 without fear of.error, which in the absence of any text is no small praise.^ 



But Buffon was not content with merely causing to be published this 

 unparalleled set of plates. He seems to have regarded the work just 

 named as a necessary precursor to his own labours in Ornithology. His 

 Histoire Naturelle, g^n^rale et particuliere, was begun in 1749, and in 1770 

 he brought out, with the assistance of Gu^nau de Montbeillard,^ the first 

 volume of that grand undertaking relating to Birds, which, for the first 

 time, became the theme of one who possessed real literary capacity. It 



^ Tliey were drawn and engraved by Martinet, who himself began in 1787 a 

 Histoire des Oiseaux with small coloured plates which have some merit, but the text 

 is worthless. The work seems not to have been finished, and is rare. For the 

 opportunity of seeing a copy I was indebted to my kind friend the late Mr. Guruey. 



^ Between 1767 and 1776 there appeared at Florence a Storia Naturale degli 

 Uccelli, in five folio volumes, containing a number of ill-drawn and ill-coloured figures 

 from the collection of Giovanni Gerini, an ardent collector who, having died in 1751, 

 must be acquitted of any share in the work, which, though sometimes attributed to 

 him, is that of certain learned men who did not happen to be ornithologists (cf. Savl, 

 Ornithologia Toscana, i. Introduzione, p. v.). 



^ He retired on the completion of the sixth volume, and thereui^ou Buffon 

 associated Bexon with himself. 



