298 Letters, Extracts, and Notes. 



willing to record their observations or seeking further 

 information upon the subject. 



The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. — The 

 General Meeting of the Royal Society for the Protection of 

 Birds for the present year was held on the 21st of February 

 last. Her Grace The Duchess of Portland, the President, 

 was in the Chair, and was supported by many distinguished 

 Bird-lovers, amongst whom were several of our best-known 

 Ornithologists. The Report of the Council gave a very 

 good account of the present condition and future prospects 

 of the Society, which had received an addition of 439 annual 

 subscribers during the past year. The chief events of the 

 year had been the Incorporation of the Society by Royal 

 Charter and the passing of two Acts of Parliament — one 

 for rendering the employment of the "poletrap" illegal, 

 and the other for extending the operation of the Birds- 

 Protection Acts (with certain limitations) to St. Kilda. 

 But various minor measures relating to the protection of 

 Bird-life had been taken, and were mentioned in the Report. 

 The main object of the Society, to put it shortly, is, in the 

 words of Sir Edward Grey used on a former occasion, " to 

 prevent the world from being impoverished and part of its 

 beauty from being lost by the destruction of wild birds." 

 We believe that all members of the B. O. U. join cordially 

 in this wish, and we urge them to give their support to this 

 excellent Society, the headquarters of which are at 3 Hanover 

 Square., London. 



New Bird-Books in preparation. — We have received pro- 

 spectuses of several new ornithological works shortly to be 

 published or in preparation. Mr. Porter announces the 

 issue of a work by Mr. J. I. S. Whitaker on 'The Birds of 

 Tunisia/ in two volumes, royal 8vo, of which the first, we 

 believe, is almost ready, also of a volume on the ' Ornithology 

 of the Bahamas' by Mr. J. Lewis Bonhote, which will contain 

 an appendix on the Mammalia, Lepidoptera, and Arachnida 



