33 The Wilson Bulletin— No. 66. 



American Birds/ which, according to Coues, raised the num- 

 ber of species to 3GG, and of genera to S3, nearly a hundred 

 species having thus been made known since Ord laid aside the 

 pen that Wilson had dropped. Apparently the author had 

 nearly completed his share of the work on the fourth number 

 before his departure, and why Carey, Lea, and Carey delayed 

 its publication until 1833, is impossible to conjecture, unless it 

 was incident to the change in the firm which became Carey and 

 Lea, with William Brown as printer as formerly. In a letter 

 to his engraver in October, 1839, the author expressed surprise 

 that he has heard nothing of it and directs Lawson to draw on 

 his account, or, preferably, the publishers, for services as en- 

 graver ; generously suggesting that the price 60 (dollars?) as 

 fixed by publishers, should be 90 (dollars?) the price paid for 

 the engraving of the Condor plate. The Prince had planned a 

 fifth volume, and Lawson was to begin on a plate composed of 

 the Canada Goose, a large Godwit with a black tail, and a 

 young PJicnicapicrus ; and continue with the Pelican, Gulls, 

 «S:c. His scientific friend, William Cooper, of New York, to 

 whom he had dedicated the Cooper's Hawk, was to furnish 

 the drawings, and the birds, as well as all the directions. Of 

 this nothing further is heard. 



Coues aptly terms Bonaparte's American Ornithology a 

 quasi-continuation of Wilson's work, gotten up in similar style, 

 if not spirit ; and warns the student that the original distinction 

 and complete separation of the two works must be fully 

 recognized. 



In figuring and describing the females and immatures of a 

 number of species, Bonaparte supplied a desiderata, and ren- 

 dered his labors, in a manner, supplementary to that of Wil- 

 son. The work is not remarkable for the number of new spe- 

 cies described, although here the majority are correctly figured 

 for the first time The Semipalmated Plover {JigiaUtis scnii- 

 paliiiata)- he had already found distinct and had separated it 

 from Wilson's Ring Plover (Charadriiis hi'sticida) wliich Ord 



^ Zooloj;i<^"il Journal, 111, pi). 4!)-r>:;. 



"Observations on the Nouienelature of Wilson's Ornitliolojiy. 

 Jour. Acad. Nat. Sci., Pbila., Y, 1825, \). 98. 



