1917-] Recently published Ornithological Works. 453 



" button-bush '^ gi'owiug in an old mud-hole, and is well 

 illustrated in three photographs. 



The usual report on the spring migration in the Delaware 

 valley, compiled by Mr. Witmer Stone from the schedules 

 filled in by members of the Club, is always a valuable 

 feature of this magazine. 



Journal of the South African Ornithologists^ Union. 



[The Journal of the South African Ornithologists' Union. Vol. xi. 

 no. 2. December 1916.] 



This, we notice with great regret, will be the last number 

 of the Journal to appear. It has been found impossible in 

 so thinly populated a country to keep up sufficient interest 

 in one department of Zoological Science alone to maintain 

 a separate journal, and it has therefore been decided to 

 found a new Society to be called the South African 

 Biological and Natural History Society^ which will absorb 

 the South African Ornithologists" Union and the Transvaal 

 Biological Society. It is the intention of the new Society 

 to issue a quarterly Journal of Natural History dealing 

 with all zoological subjects, and it is hoped that the first 

 number will be issued this year. 



The first part of the present series of volumes was 

 issued in 1905, and the eleven completed volumes 

 contain numerous valuable observations and descriptions 

 of the utmost importance to all students of African 

 Ornithology. 



The present number is chiefly taken up with a list of the 

 birds of Humansdorp, a district in the eastern half of the 

 Cape Province, by Mr. B. A. Masterson. This is followed 

 by a Report on the summer migration of 1915-16 as 

 observed in the eastern districts of the Cape Province by 

 the Rev. R. Godfrey. Mr. Swynnerton pleads for some 

 observations bearing on the coloration of birds' eggs^ in 

 continuation of his researches and experiments published 

 in 'The Ibis' last year; and the number concludes with 

 some notices and circulars explaining the reasons for the 

 formation of the new Society and the winding-up of the 

 South African Ornithologists' Union. 



