^"'igifi^'] Correspondence. 265 



referred to Siawell, Whittlesea, and other places where I have 

 seen this bird nesting. This form is plentifully distributed over 

 the whole of the State, \\ath the exception, perhaps, of the north- 

 western part of Victoria. 



By way of answer to Mr. Campbell's query as to Tyto longi- 

 meinbris walleri, I would refer him to the list I was criticising. 

 Xaturally, I used the names given therein. Mr. Mathews has 

 placed the Australian Grass-Owl in the genus Tyio, and gives its 

 range as New South Wales, Queensland, and Northern Territory ; 

 but there are two fine specimens of this bird mounted in the Aus- 

 tralian collection at the Melbourne National Museum. Both 

 specimens were obtained in Victoria in April, 1890, but the exact 

 locaHty, unfortunately, is not known. 



If Mr. Campbell had been conversant with the list now under 

 discussion he would not have written that the use of " bald, 

 Cerberus-headed, pre\dously-unheard-of names may prove a 

 serious drawback in Australian ornithology." Many of the names 

 used by Mr. Mathews have been rescued from obscurity, and 

 others must be similarly brought to light from time to time if 

 the "law of priority" is to be observed. When the name of a 

 bird is changed, or an old name is substituted for one recently in 

 use, most of those who are keenly interested ascertain as soon 

 as possible the reason or reasons for the alteration. The list 

 produced by Mr. Mathews will not prove a drawback to Aus- 

 tralian ornithology. On the contrary, it has already borne good 

 fruit, for it is one of the incentives for the proposal to issue a new 

 R.A.O.U. Check-list.— Yours, &c., 

 Canterburv. ist Februarv, iQiO. FRANK E. HOWE. 



COLORATION AND CLASSIFICATION, 



To the Editors of " The Emu." 



Gentlemen, — I should be grateful if you would afford me an 

 opportunity of placing before my brother ornithologists in Aus- 

 traUa, whose good opinion I value, a more exact version of my 

 \'iews on the significance of coloration as a factor in avian 

 classification than that given by Mr. Gregory M. Mathews in The 

 Emu of October last,* which I read with amazement. 



Mr. Mathews is presumably anxious to show that his views on 

 this theme have my support, but his methods of demonstrating 

 this are, to say the least, questionable. 



To begin with, he evidently deems it inadvisable to inform his 

 readers that his report of my part in this debate is taken, verbatim, 

 from the Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club. Nor does 

 he state that, to achieve his purpose — whatever that may have 

 been— he had to omit the passages which I now beg to restore 

 to their context. 



Mr. Mathews has been very thorough in his misquotations. 



* Emu, vol. XV., pp. 118-130. 



