v! Preface to Original Editfon. 



nesting or breeding-season peculiarities of every un- 

 doubtedly British-breeding species. And the author's 

 difficulty has often been, out of the large mass of 

 available materials at his command, acquired by 

 personal observation or from the reading and notes of 

 many years, to select v^^hat might be instructive, in- 

 teresting, or amusing, without burdening the book 

 with unnecessary details, or encroaching too much on 

 the allotted space. 



The principle adopted in the illustrations has been 

 to omit all representations of eggs either white or 

 nearly white in colour, in order to husband space for 

 the admission of a greater number of those char- 

 acterised by varied colours and markings. On the 

 same ground, although it was earnestly desired by the 

 artist to give more than one representation of some of 

 the very marked variations occurring in the eggs of 

 several species, he has been compelled to content him- 

 self with selecting and figuring the most typical or 

 normal forms in all such cases. All the illustrations 

 given have been carefully drawn from unquestionable 

 specimens, and Mr. Coleman desires to acknowledge 

 in this place the assistance which, in this matter, has 

 been afforded him by that excellent and accurate 

 practical naturalist, Mr. F. Bond. 



An Appendix is subjoined, in which a notice will be 

 found of the habits of nidification, the nest and eggs 

 of several birds, which, though regular inhabitants of 

 Britain or some part of it, for a given portion of each 

 year, still retire to foreign and distant localities for 

 the purpose of nest-making and rearing their young. 



Finally, an attempt has been made to exhibit at one 



