THE OSPREY. 



109 



Notes. 



BROWN'S ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE AMERICAN 

 ORNITHOLOGY OF WILSON AND BONAPARTE. 



Ill the second number of the present volume of 

 The Osprey (p. 31) we partly answered a corres- 

 pondent's question respecting' Brown's repro- 

 duction of the plates of Wilson and Bonaparte's 

 American Ornithology. We are now enabled 

 to give more specific information. Doctor 

 Gill, while in London, examined the copy of the 

 work in the Library of the Zoological Society 

 and. with the assistance of Mr. Waterhouse, the 

 librarian, compared some of the illustrations 

 with the originals of Wilson. The title of the 

 work is correctly given, so far as it goes, in the 

 Catalogue of the Library and thus disagrees 

 with those recorded in Agassiz and Strickland's 

 Bibliography and Engelmann's Bibliotheca; 

 in full, it is as follows: — 



"Illustrations of the American Ornithology of 

 Alexander Wilson and Charles Lucien Bona- 

 parte, Prince of Musignano. With the addition 

 of nu in ere his recently discovered species and rep- 

 resentations of the whole Sylva of North America. 

 By Captain Thomas Brown, [etc., etc.]. Edin- 

 burgh, Frazer & Co., 54 North Bridge William 

 Curry Jun'r cV Co., Dublin & Smith. Elder & 

 Co.. 6S Cornhill i London, I MDCCCXXXV. 

 [fol.,eng. tit. [=11.] +ded. eng. |= 11.]+ -\ St. 

 index [= 11.], 124 pi.] 



The figures of birds are reproduced from Wil- 

 son's and Bonaparte's works on the 124 plates 

 with tolerable closeness to the originals, but 

 sometimes with the figures at different angles, 

 and with the coloration not exact. The coll. .ca- 

 tion of the species is original, and the grouping 

 is mainly by genera adopted from Temmiiick. 

 The birds are arranged ..n figures of branches of 

 trees copied from Michaux. 



In the words of the compiler, "The arrang- 

 meiit adopted is that of Temminck slightlj 

 altered, with the addition of some new Genera. 

 One hundred and sixty-one birds have been 

 added by the Editor, which are distinguished 

 by an *; and eighty-seven birds have been con- 

 siderably enlarged; these latter are marked by 

 a f prefixed. Besides the addition of one hun- 

 dred and sixty-seven representations of Forest 

 Trees and Shrubs." 



There is no explanatory text except the data 

 here reproduced and the names of the birds and 

 trees. 



North American birds than has Gray's Tanager 

 or the Troupial. 



The bird is now alive and well at the National 

 Zoological Park.— C. W. R. 



SWAINSON'S HAWK IN EASTERN KANSAS. 



It may be of interest to Kansas Ornithologists 

 to know, that on April 23, 1901 while on an ex- 

 tensive collecting trip in Linn County, I found 

 a pair of Swainson's Hawks constructing a nest 

 in an elm that grew on the west bank of Sugar 

 Creek. 2s miles from the Missouri State line. 

 Latitude 37°, longitude 95°. Owing to limited 

 amount of time I was unable to stay and watch 

 developments. — WALTER STOTT Coi.vin. 



Life Histories of North American Birds, 

 of which two volumes by the late Major Charles 

 Bendire were published in 1892 and 1895, will 

 be continued by Major Bendire's successor in 

 the U. S. National Museum, Dr. W. L. Ralph. 

 The continuation will be on the same lines as 

 the volumes already published. It may be re- 

 called that the first of these was devoted to the 

 Gallinaceous and Raptorial birds, and the second 

 to the series "from the Parrots to the Crackles" 

 or Icteridas. 



Blue Jay ON a Spree. "Naw. sir, I run him 

 down. He's drunk on mad-berries. I didn't 

 shoot him." So said our little stable boy. John 

 Henry. We examined the beautiful Blue Jay. 

 It was lying in the boy's hand, with a sort of 

 cotented expression on its face. Its saucy eyes 

 were elate and fearless. Its head wagged ridi- 

 culously in the effort to hold it up. It was 

 simply drunk, nothing less. The bird was in- 

 toxicated on the berries of the "Pride of China", 

 known throughout the south as the poison or 

 mad-berry. 



In Floridy thousands of respectable northern 

 Robins that would blush to do it at home, arc 

 found lying about in a state of grossest drunken- 

 ness from the same cause. We wondered if some 

 white ribbon society might not be profitably 

 started among these poor birds. But they do 

 not know any better. We have this advantage 

 over them — we know the mad-berry when we 

 see it. It is to our disgrace if we do not let it 

 alone. — The Plymouth Review. 



Nicobar Pigeon in Virginia. Early in July, 

 Mr. D. A. Barnes, of Petersburg'. Virginia, 

 found a strange bird in the mountains between 

 Bedford and Bluefields, on the New River Divi- 

 sion of the N. W. R. R. He sent the bird alive 

 to the National Museum for identification. It 

 proved to be a Nicobar Pigeon and was proba- 

 bly brought to this country by some soldier re- 

 turning from the Philippines. Although found 

 running about in a state of freedom in the 

 woods, it is without doubt an escaped cage bird, 

 and has no more right to figure in a list of 



Vanishing Bird Races. The Flamingo and 

 the Pink Curlew are no more, the Paroquet and 

 Egret are going fast, the White Pelican is a 

 tradition only, like the Dodo. Some birds in- 

 crease under the protection of man because he 

 wages war on more destructive enemies. The 

 Quail sets at naught the breach-loader and the 

 trap if allowed to forage in the green-fields, but 

 there are others that vanish before the face of 

 man as does the mist before the morning sun. 

 We may delay the end, perhaps, but it is at last 

 the survival of the fit. — Florida Times-l 'nioii. 



