INTRODUCTION 35 



most peaceable ornithologists found it best to bend to the furious blast, 

 and in some sort to acquiesce at least in the phraseology of the self- 

 styled interpreters of Creative Will. But, while thus lamenting thia 

 unfortunate perversion into a mistaken channel of ornithological energy, 

 we must not over-blame those who caused it. Macleay indeed never 

 pretended to a high position in this branch of science, his tastes lying in 

 the direction of Entomology ; but few of their countrymen knew more 

 of Birds than did Swainson and Vigors ; and, while the latter, as editor 

 for many years of the Zoological Journal, and the first Secretary of the 

 Zoological Society, has especial claims to the regard of all zoologists, so 

 the former's indefatigable pursuit of Natural History, and conscientious 

 labour in its behalf — among other ways by means of his graceful pencil 

 — deserve to be remembered as a set-off against the injury he unwittingly 

 caused. 



It is now incumbent upon us to take a rapid survey of the orni- 

 thological works which come more or less under the designation of 

 " Faunee " ; ^ but these are so numerous that it will be necessary to limit 

 this survey, as before indicated, to those countries alone which form the 

 homes of English people, or are commonly visited by them in ordinary 

 travel. 



Beginning with our Antipodes, it is hardly needful to go further 

 back than Sir Walter Buller's beautiful Birds of New Zealand (4to, 

 1872-73 ; ed. 2, 2 vols. 1888), with coloured plates by Mr. Keulemans, 

 and the same author's Manual of the Birds of New Zealand (Svo, 1882), 

 founded on the former ; but justice requires that mention be made of 

 the labours of G. R. Gray, first in the Appendix to Dieffenbach's Travels 

 in New Zealand (1843) and then in the ornithological portion of the 

 Zoology of the Voyage of H. M.S. ^Erebus' and ^Terror,' begun in 1844, 

 but left unfinished from the following year until completed by Dr. 

 Sharpe in 1876. A considerable number of valuable papers on the 

 Ornithology of the country by Sir James Hector and Sir Julius Von 

 Haast, Prof. Hutton, Mr. Potts and others are to be found in the Trans- 

 actions arid Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute. 



Passing to Australia, we have the first good description of some of its 

 Birds in the several old voyages and in Latham's works before men- 

 tioned. Shaw's Zoology of New Holland (4to, 1794), though unfinished, 

 added that of a few more, as did J. W. Lewin's Birds of New Holland 

 (4to, London : 1808), of which, under the title of A Natxiral History of 

 the Birds of New South Wales, a second edition, with 26 instead of 18 

 plates, appeared in 1822, the year after the author's death, and a third 

 with additions by Eyton, Gould and others in 1838. Gould's great 

 Birds of Australia has been already named, and he subsequently repro- 

 duced with some additions the text of that work under the title of 

 Handbook to the Birds of Australia (2 vols. Svo, 1865). In 1866 Mr. 

 Diggles commenced a similar publication, The Ornithology of Australia, 

 but the coloured plates are not comparable with those of his predecessor. 

 This is still incomplete, though the parts that appeared were collected to 



^ A very useful list of more general scope is given as the Appendix to an Address 

 by Mr. Sclater to the British Association in 1875 [B-ejiort, pt. li, pp. 114.-133). 



