BIRDS OF 



prefer taking a cursory glance at what has been written about 

 American birds from the dale of the earliest records we have on the 

 subject up to the present time, — calling your attention to a few of 

 the more remarkable species found near this city ; and leaving with 

 the Association a list of all the birds which have been observed in 

 Ontario, with special reference to those found in our near neighbor- 

 hood. This list, I hope, may be useful to the rising generation of 

 Ornithologists, serving as time rolls on, to show by comparison what 

 changes take place in the number and distribution of the different 

 species. So long ago as 18()0, I read a similar paper, and presented 

 to this Association a similar list, which subsequently appeared in 

 the Canadian yournal for that year; but so many changes have, 

 since that time, been made in the nomenclature, and in the arrange- 

 ment of the different groups, that we would not now be able to 

 recognize the birds by the names then given them. These frequent 

 changes have been a constant source of annoyance to the students 

 who, after getting fairly familiar with the system, and having 

 occasion to leave it (or a short time, may find on his return that he 

 will have to begin all over again, and learn to recognize his old 

 friends by new names — an experience which is certainly very dis- 

 couraging, and yet when we consider how these changes are brought 

 about, it seems hardly possible for the present to avoid the difficulty. 



To such as have given even a limited amount of attention to 

 the subject, it will be apparent that among birds there e.xists certain 

 natural groups or families, the members of which are related to each 

 other. Classification undertakes to separate and set apart each of 

 those groups by itself, under a special family name, and did we 

 know all the birds in existence, and in what ways they resemble each 

 other, and in what ways they differ, the work would be comparatively 

 easy ; but unfortunately, here as elsewhere, human knowledge is 

 incomplete, and the results are defective for want of proper data. 

 Besides the difticullies arising from defective knowledge of the 

 subject, it is evident that the arrangement of the groups can be 

 carried out in different ways, as viewed from different standpoints : 

 One may take as the basis of his system the formation of the bill 

 and feet, while another, ignoring these points, miy class together 

 only such birds as resemble each other in their anatomical structure, 

 and each of these systematists having his followers writing and 



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