Introduction. 15 



the lie to museums, or people might well turn from 

 ornithology with feelings akin to disgust As it is, 

 the woods, fields, mountain-sides, and river-valleys 

 tell another and a charming story, of which, I would 

 be glad to think, the pages that follow give back a 

 faint echo. 



However this may prove, the portraits of birds 

 here given, from the skilful hand of my friend Wil- 

 liam Everett Cram, tell their own stoty. They are 

 speaking likenesses that call for no explanatory text 

 Charles Conrad Abbott. 



Three Beeches, January 19, 1896. 



