Burns — On Alexander Wilson. 13 



inasmuch as the figures of the female Marsh Blackbird 

 (Birds of yliiicrica, plate G-T) and that of the male Mississippi 

 Kite (same work, plate 117) have both been copied from 

 the American Ornithology, without the least acknowledg- 

 ment of the source whence they had been derived. Mr. Ord 

 thought that the charge of plagiarism came with ill grace 

 from one who had been guilty of it himself, as in the instance 

 above named. Wilson states that he shot the bird figured and 

 described in his (Jth volume, page G'3, in an orchard, on the 

 34th of April. ]\lr. Ord confirms this statement, by declaring 

 to this society that he himself was with Wilson on the day 

 in question; that he sa\y and examined the specimen; and that 

 Wilson assured him it was entirely new to him. W'ilson was 

 then residing at the Bartram Botanic Garden near Philadel- 

 phia. Mr. Ord further read to the society a letter addressed 

 to him by the artist, Mr. Lawson, who engraved the plate in 

 which the Small-headed Flycatcher is figured. This gentle- 

 man affirms, that all the plates, which he 'engraved for the 

 American Ornithology, w-ere from Wilson's own drawings, 

 and that in respect to the plate in which the Small-headed 

 Flycatcher appeared, specimens of all the birds represented 

 accompanied the drawings ; and he, after getting his outlines, 

 worked from them. Mr. Ord laid before the society a proof 

 of the etching of this plate, and remarked, that from the 

 minuteness of the details, the point of the engraver had a 

 greater share in producing the desired result, than even the 

 pencil of the ornithologist.''^ It will be recalled that Ord 

 frequently accompanied Wilson on his later local collecting- 

 trips. It was on one of those jaunts he secured the first and 

 only example of the Cape May Warbler, Dcndroica iigrina, 

 Wilson ever saw. 



Audubon complained, several years previous to this, that 

 Ord assailed him with bitter enmity. His son \^ictor G. and 

 other friends loyally replied to Charles Waterton's shallow 

 criticisms and broad display of ignorance,- and Ur. John 



^ Proceedings American Pliilosophical Society, Vol. I, 1840. 



= London's Magazine of Natnral Ilistovv, Vol. VI, 183?.. pp. 215-218. 



369-372; Vol. VII, 1834, pp. G6-74. Journal Boston Society of Natural 



History, Vol. I, 1834, pp. 15-31. ' National Intelligencer, 1834. 



