° - i9is J Recent Literature. 2i4lO 



appreciate his motives in limiting his list strictly to species which were 

 encountered by his expeditions, we cannot but regret — even though our 

 attitude be admittedly selfish — - that he did not in some way include at 

 least the land birds reported by others from Colombia, thus making his 

 report monographic. The knowledge of the relationships of such forms, 

 which he must have acquired in working up his collections, would have 

 been of the greatest value to others. 



The best test of a work of this kind is the actual use of the volume and 

 having had occasion recently to study two neotropical collections, from 

 adjacent areas, in which study Dr. Chapman's work was extensively used, 

 the writer can testify to the admirable style of its arrangement and to its 

 thorough accuracy. 



As regards nomenclature, Dr. Chapman adopts subspecies rather more 

 liberally than most recent writers — that is to say, he treats certain forms 

 as subspecies which others would regard as of full specific rank. This is 

 a practice of which we thoroughly approve, since to our mind a name should 

 be made to express as much as possible, and if one form is clearly a deriva- 

 tive of another, the trinomial appellation showing this relation carries 

 more information than would the binomial, while the fact that actual 

 intergradation between the two has not been proven is not of sufficient 

 importance to warrant an expression in nomenclature. In regard to genera, 

 Dr. Chapman expresses himself at some length against then* undue multi- 

 plication and rejects Eupsychortyx as not separable from Colinas; and 

 Dictiopicus as not distinct from Dryobates. While here again we are in 

 sympathy with our author's attitude it seems that while sacrificing the 

 above mentioned genera, he retains quite a number apparently not any 

 better differentiated. This question must probably be settled by con- 

 vention as genera are matters of opinion and then* relative importance 

 cannot be settled by any criterion or rule. The opinion of one author 

 is probably as good as that of another and all will differ to some extent. 



There are many other portions of this admirable work upon which we 

 are unable here to comment — the discussion of climate and precipitation 

 and their influence on the formation of life zones; the formation of the 

 cloud forests; the various faunas into which the zones are divided, etc. 

 Enough has been said however, to show the comprehensive character of 

 the work, and the broad way in which the subject is handled. 



Mention must however, be made of the numerous excellent maps and 

 distributional charts and the four attractive colored plates from paintings 

 by Louis Agassiz Fuertes, who accompanied Dr. Chapman upon the two 

 expeditions in which he took part — also the energy and ability of the 

 corps of collectors to whose efforts the success of the several expeditions 

 was largely due: W. B. Richardson, Leo E. Miller, Arthur A. Allen, Geo. 

 K. Cherrie, Paul G. Howes, Geoffroy O'Connell, Thos. M. Ring, and 

 Howarth Boyle. 



This volume is entitled " A Contribution to a Biological Survey of South 

 America." We feel sure that it will be the wish of every naturalist who 



