^"'■'goz^^l Recent LUerature. IO9 



list of tlie mammals, with descriptions of several new species, follows, 

 succeeded by a briefly annotated list of 98 species of birds (pp. 38-50). 

 About one third of these are given on the authority of Rev. J. H. Keen, 

 an observant missionary long resident at Massett, Graham Island, and 

 other authorities, while about one sixth are recorded as ' seen ' or ' heard,' 

 and in too many instances for a creditable hard-and-fast list, as "sup- 

 posed" or "thought to be " this or that species. Of course, in so short a 

 time, large collections could not be made, and it would seem better to be 

 content with a smaller list based on positive information than to increase 

 it at the cost of many weak or uncertain records, however great the prob- 

 abilities in their favor. Yet much valuable ornithological material 

 was obtained, on which are based several new forms, here for the first 

 time described, namely: (1) Nyctala acadica scotcea, (2) Dryohatcs picoi- 

 deics, (3) Cyanocitta siellcri carloftce ; to which should be added (4) 

 Sphyrapicus ruber flaz<ive7itris (Vieillot), by which name Mr. Osgood 

 proposes to recognize the northern Red-breasted Sapsucker of Van- 

 couver Island and the mainland of British Columbia. 



The Cook Inlet country was reached August 21, and work was car- 

 ried on till September 28. This was " the only general district of con- 

 sequence on the Pacific coast of Alaska that had not been recently visited 

 by naturalists," and the results obtained there by Messrs. Osgood and 

 Heller are therefore of imusual importance. The region is treated in this 

 paper after the same general plan as the Qvieen Charlotte Islands, namely, 

 a statement is given of the itinerary, an account of the physiography, flora, 

 and fauna, including an annotated list of the trees and woody plants, as 

 well as of the mammals and birds. The annotated list of birds (pp.72-Si) 

 numbers 78 species, of which about 30 are based on specimens in the U. S. 

 National Museum taken by Ferdinand Bischoff at Fort Kanai in 1S69, or 

 by Bean, Townsend and Evermann during brief visits to Cook Inlet in 

 the Fish Commission steamer ' Fish-hawk.' As no account of the Bisch- 

 off Collection, aside from casual references to individual specimens, has 

 been published, Mr. Osgood's record of this material is a most welcome 

 addition to his list, which contains much valuable information based on 

 his own observations. 



Respecting the Cook Inlet region in general, Mr. Osgood states that 

 "the plant and animal life of Cook Inlet is very closely similar to that 

 of the Yukon Valley, or in more general terms, to that of the interior of 

 Alaska. This condition is the more noteworthy, since the fauna and the 

 flora of the same coast south of Cook Inlet are in marked contrast to 

 those of the interior in the same latitude. Since coast influences are 

 usually conducive to life that is relatively more boreal than that of the 

 interior, large faunal regions of the interior seldom extend to the actual 

 coast, except with considerable modification."" 



The half-tone plates contain eight views of the characteristic vegetation 

 and scenery of the two regions visited, and six figures illustrate the skulls 

 of new species of mammals described from the Qiieen Charlotte Islands. 



