INTKODUCTION. xv 



1839. In this year appeared the Natural History of South 

 Devon, from the pen of Mr. J. C. Bellamy of Yeahnpton, who 

 dated the preface in December of the previous year. Bellamy was 

 primarily a geologist, and as an ornithologist he manifestly relied 

 much on the judgment of Dr. ]\Ioore, but he was a keen observer 

 of the habits of birds, and must have been a man of considerable 

 scientific attainments. The striking feature of the book is to be 

 found in the elaborate pains taken to describe the physical 

 characteristics of the region investigated. 



1863. Mr. J. Brooking Rowe, who, like Dr. Moore, was a 

 Secretary of the Plymouth Institute, published in the year 1863 a 

 list of the Vertebrate Animals of Devon. Of the care bestowed 

 upon its preparation, it would be difficult to speak too highly. 

 To ornithologists, its value is augmented by the fact that the 

 catalogue of birds was revised by the late Mr. Gatcombe, to 

 whose experience the author expresses his indebtedness. Of the 

 papers and lists that have since appeared, the majority 

 were published in the Zoologist, which since its foundation 

 in 1843 has worthily received the support of most British 

 faunists. Their authors include the names of the late 

 Mr. Gatcombe, the late Mr. Stevenson, the late Mr. J. H. Gurney, 

 Baron A. von Hiigel, and some others. 



Those relating to the North of the County were penned by 

 the Rev. M. A. Mathew, who with Mr. G. F. Mathew accomplished 

 most of the ornithological investigations carried out on the shores 

 of the Bristol Channel. Mr. D'Urban, of Exeter, and the 

 Rev. M. S. C. Rickards have contributed a fair share of separate 

 notes to the same journal, but do not appear to have written 

 papers of any length. 



