

J I ! L 



c 



CONCLUSION. 



The chief object of the present paper is to intercede in favour of 

 the promotion of Ornithophaeonology in a manner worthy of its scien 

 tific character. 



The critical Summary of categories, into which Ornithophaenology 

 may be divided, clearly shows that our positive knowledge of bird-migra- 

 tion is still a very insignificant one; that so-called sentences (dogmas) 

 prevail which sometimes sound very ingenious, but, critically taken, are 

 void of every firm foundation. 



The comparatively small intrinsic contents of Ornithophaenology 

 are on one hand a consequence of the nature of the subject, viz. of the 

 fact that we are only able to make observation of fragments of mig- 

 ration; that the observation of this interzonal phenomenon is carried 

 out locally only, so that the connexion between the local phenomena 

 or observations, is in the highest degree a loose one; and finally that 

 the majority of observations in the whole is confined but to the palae- 

 arctic part of Europe; while on the other hand the observation lacks 

 all organisation, and the working up of the results is not carried out 

 according to a uniform method, both of which conditions are indispen- 

 sable to the solution of so difficult a problem. 



BZD 65 09 9 



