PREFACE. 



Within the last thirty years a number of works treating 

 of the ornithology of different districts in Great Britain 

 have appeared. Not only do these afford to the resident of 

 some particular locality trustworthy information about the 

 birds of his own neighbourhood, but they also supply ornitho- 

 logists generally with the means of comparing the avifauna 

 of various districts, and of determining with some accuracy 

 the distribution of the birds of these islands during the time 

 which they spend within our shores. 



With the exception of Middlesex, Nottinghamshire, North- 

 amptonshire, Herefordshire, Wiltshii-e^ Berkshire, and Buck- 

 inghamshire, the counties thus treated of have been those 

 possessing a considerable extent of seaboard, and no work 

 upon the birds of Oxfordshire in a collected and accessible 

 form has yet been written. 



To fill up this blank, in some measure at the least, by 

 contributiug to the series of county faunal works the re- 

 quisite information relating to Oxfordshire, and to furnish 

 the residents in the county with some idea of the bids 

 around them, are the objects of the present volume. 



For some years past 1 have been engaged in collecting 

 materials for an account of the Birds of Oxfordshire, and 

 during that time, partly by personal observation, and partly 



