90 Recent Literature. lion. 



appeared in Eaton's ' Birds of New York,' indicated pretty clearly what the 

 bird-studying public wants, for it is far easier to identify birds from good 

 colored plates than from any amount of descriptions. The publishers of 

 the present work have been fortunate in obtaining these same plates through 

 the courtesy of the New York State Museum, and they naturally form one 

 of the leading features of the volumes. Mr. Henry Thurston has con- 

 tributed a series of five colored plates of birds' eggs which are very satis- 

 factory. Then there are a large number of half-tone text figures of birds 

 from colored drawings by Mr. R. I. Brasher which vary considerably in 

 merit, but they are all minutely exact in patterns and markings and are 

 therefore often of greater value for purposes of identification than certain 

 much more artistic and lifelike bird portraits. Besides all of these there 

 are a very large number of reproductions of photographs mainly from 

 nature but some from mounted specimens, although the fact is not always 

 mentioned, and some of paintings by Mr. Bruce Horsfall. Most of this 

 last group of illustrations have already appeared in other publications 

 and are from a variety of sources. 



We regret that the publishers have seen fit to adopt the name of Audu- 

 bon's classic work as their title. Every work must stand upon its own 

 merits and it is a pity that each one cannot have a distinctive name. In 

 one respect the present work is like its great predecessor — that is in the 

 unequal treatment of the birds of the two sides of the continent. Audubon 

 of course did not possess adequate information on western birds but in the 

 present case that excuse does not exist and we fear that western ornitholo- 

 gists will resent the fact that while all of the eastern birds are figured in 

 colors not one of the distinctively western species is so depicted, most of 

 them being pictured only in half-tones and quite a number not at all. 

 The superabundance of figures of some of the eastern species on the other 

 hand seems unnecessary, if not actually confusing. With Fuertes' excel- 

 lent full page plate of the Blue Jay, it is quite unnecessary to publish a 

 figure by Brasher which shows nothing additional, to say nothing of a 

 very poor photograph of what is apparently a mounted bird. 



However these criticisms in no way detract from the fact that this work 

 places within reach of the public a splendid series of bird pictures, more 

 and better than can be gotten today in any other work, which will go far to 

 satisfy the needs of a vast number of bird students and no doubt help to 

 develop many a future ornithologist. 



The text is admittedly, in the main, compiled, and most of the accounts 

 are satisfactory, presenting concisely such information as one would desire 

 on habits, range, food, etc. The best accounts are probably those by 

 Herbert K. Job and Edward Howe Forbush. The nomenclature is that 

 of the American Ornithologists' Union Check-List and subspecies are only 

 mentioned at the end of each account, where the points by which they 

 differ are briefly stated and their ranges given, often too briefly to be of much 

 practical value. Curiously enough the name of the eastern race is always 

 given in the heading. This may be logical where, as is usually the case, 



