Their Eggs and Nests. 29 



only, so that the list can easily be cut up into separate 

 slips as desired. 



There is, however, one special advantage attaching 

 itself to the " Ibis " List. 1 mean that it gives the 

 various sjmonyms that have been proposed (and by 

 different authorities accepted) by scientific systema- 

 tists for our various British birds. To give an in- 

 stance of what I mean : — Take the well-known bird 

 called the Bullfinch. In different systems it is called 

 Loxia PyrrJuda, Pyrrhula Eiiropoea, PyrrJmla V2il~ 

 garis, PyrrJnda Rnbicilla, and Pyrrhula Pileata. 

 Here are five scientific " aliases " for one familiar bird. 

 The Lesser Redpoll and the Mealy Ptedpoll each have 

 six such " aliases',' and the Common Guillemot is so 

 very far from being ordinarily ** respectable," that it 

 has a list of seven scientific " aliases " belonging to it. 

 Of course all this is, to an outsider, very absurd;^ 

 while to a would-be learner it is very perplexing. 

 The " Ibis " List tables all these aliases, as I have 

 called them — " synonyms " the learned call them — 

 and they may be seen and scanned at one glance. 



" The nesting-places," says Mr. Headley ("Structure 

 and Life of Birds," p. 348), " the nesting-places of all 

 the British migrants except one, the Curlew Sand- 

 piper, have been found, thanks chiefly to the energy 



1 It is, however, intensified, and in a much more serious degree, 

 in the list of synonyms (or as I have called them *' aliases") given in 

 Mr. Henry Seebohm's " History of British Birds," refixed to the 

 letterpress belonging to the description of eacn several species. 

 Thus the very familiar English bird, the Chiffchaff, has no less than 

 twenty- seven scientific synonyms printed below its English (or 

 common) name. And for the purpose of this illustration, I opened 

 ou it by the merest hazard, 



