Familij ofLaniadee. 293 



been done in this, or any other country. Ornithology is neither a 

 study of names, nor of feathers ; it neither consists in giving to a 

 bird a name, nor in describing the colours of its plumage : but ra- 

 ther teaches ns to enquire what place it occupies in creation ; what 

 functions it is destined by Almighty Wisdom to perform ; how 

 its organization corresponds to these functions ; and lastly, its 

 various relations to other animated beings. 



It is to facilitate such enquiries, which shed a ray of dignity and 

 importance on the study of Nature, hitherto obscured by the mis- 

 taken zeal of nomenclators, that I have put together the following 

 observations. Whatever errors they may contain I feel confident 

 will meet with most indulgence from those who are best able to 

 understand the difficulty of the undertaking. It is a new and 

 intricate field of enquiry; which, to the honor of Britain, has 

 been opened to us by one of her sons;* but is nevertheless attend- 

 ed with peculiar embarrassments to English Naturalists, from the 

 acknowledged poverty of our Public Collections, and the total 

 want of Zoological instruction, + which our students have to con- 

 tend against. Let us hope these deficiencies, which have now 

 become a national reproach, will be soon supplied by a wise legisp 

 lature. 



Lanian^. 



The Shrikes present so many characters analogous to the FalcO" 

 nidee, or true birds of prey, that the most eminent Naturalists have 

 disagreed as to their true situation. By Ray they are placed with 

 the ylccipitres ; and this example was followed by Linnaeus. On 

 • the other hand Jirisson considered them as more closely allied io 

 the Thrushes. The opinion of M. Temminck has fluctuated ; 

 for in the first edition of the Manuel d'OrnithoIogiCj this Natural- 



• I need liardiy explain, that I here allude to the profound observations 

 coatained in the Ilorec Entomoiogicae of Mr. William S. MacLeay. 



+ Well may the foreij;ner wiio Ijeliolds our learned cstahlislimonts, so splen- 

 didly endowed, note, among the most remarkable circumstances attending 

 them, that in none whatever bhould tlierc be a Zoological chair. — Ilor. Ent. 

 2 p. 456. note. 



