60 DICTIONARY OF BIRDS 
that in this passage, as well as in others that might be quoted, he was 
greater as an anatomist than as a logician. He was indeed thoroughly 
grounded in anatomy, and though undoubtedly the digestive organs of 
Birds have a claim to the fullest consideratign, yet Macgillivray himself 
subsequently became aware of the fact that there were several other parts 
of their structure as important from the point of view of classification. 
He it was, apparently, who first detected the essential difference of the 
organs of voice presented by some of the New-World Passeres (subsequently 
known as Clamatores), and the earliest intimation of this seems to be 
given in his anatomical description of the Arkansas Flycatcher, Tyrannus 
verticalis, which was published in 1838 (Ornithol. Biog. iv. p. 425), though 
it must be admitted that he did not—because he then could not—perceive 
the bearing of their difference, which was reserved to be shewn by the 
investigation of a still greater anatomist, and of one who had fuller 
facilities for research, and thereby almost revolutionized, as will presently 
be mentioned, the views of systematists as to this Order of Birds. There 
is only space here to say that the second volume of Macgillivray’s work 
was published in 1839, and the third in 1840; but it was not until 
1852 that the author, in broken health, found an opportunity of issuing 
the fourth and fifth. His scheme of classification, being as before stated 
partial, need not be given in detail. Its great merit is that it proved the 
necessity of combining another and hitherto much-neglected factor in any 
natural arrangement, though vitiated as so many other schemes have 
been by being based wholly on one class of characters. 
But a bolder attempt at classification was that made in 1838 by 
Blyth (Mag. Nat. Hist. New Ser. ii. pp. 256-268, 314-319, 351-361, 
420-426, 589-601 ; iil. pp. 76-84). It was limited, however, to what he 
called Insessores, being the group upon which that name had been conferred 
by Vigors (Trans. Linn. Soc. xiv. p. 405) in 1823, with the addition, more- 
over, of his Raptores, and it will be unnecessary to enter into particulars 
concerning it, though it is equally as remarkable for the insight shewn 
by the author into the structure of Birds as for the breadth of his view, 
which comprehends almost every kind of character that had been at that time 
brought forward. It is plain that Blyth saw, and perhaps he was the 
first to see it, that Geographical Distribution was not unimportant in 
suggesting the affinities and differences of natural groups (pp. 258, 259) ; 
and, undeterred by the precepts and practice of the hitherto dominant 
English school of Ornithologists, he declared that “anatomy, when aided 
by every character which the manner of propagation, the progressive 
1 This is not the place to dwell on Macgillivray’s merits ; but I may perhaps be 
excused for repeating my opinion that, after Willughby, Macgillivray was the greatest 
and most original ornithological genius save one (who did not live long enough to 
make his powers widely known) that this island has produced. The exact amount of 
assistance he aiforded to Audubon in his Ornithological Biography will probably never 
be ascertained ; but, setting aside “all the anatomical descriptions, as well as the 
sketches by which they are sometimes illustrated,” that on the latter’s own statement 
(op. cit. iv. Introduction, p. xxiii.) are the work of Macgillivray, no impartial reader 
can compare the style in which the History of British Birds is written with that of 
the Ornithological Biography without recognizing the similarity of the two. On this 
subject some remarks of Prof. Coues (Bull. Nutt. Ornithol, Club, 1880, p. 201) may 
well be consulted. 
