1920 J Recent Literature. 155 



Burns' ' Ornithology of Chester County, Pennsylvania.' 1 — Proba- 

 bly no county in the United States can boast of as many bird-lists as Chester 

 County, Pa., and in the little volume before us we now have another, more 

 pretentious than any of its predecessors, and aiming to embody all the 

 information which they contain as well as much original material. 



Mr. Burns has been engaged in preparing this work for some years past, 

 and his personal experience, extending over a period of thirty-five years, 

 combined with his extensive knowledge of the work of his predecessors 

 and the local literature well fit him for the preparation of such a volume. 



The exceptional development of ornithological interest in Chester 

 County seems to be due largely to the Quakers who settled much of the 

 eastern and southern portions and who from the earliest times possessed a 

 strong interest in nature study and a full appreciation of its importance. 

 A glance at the list of former scholars of the famous Quaker boarding school 

 at Westtown, will show the names of nearly all of the early ornithologists 

 of the Philadelphia region, from Thomas Say down, and even today West- 

 town graduates constitute one of the strongest elements in the makeup 

 of the Delaware Valley Ornithological Club. 



Part I of Mr. Burn's little work is entitled " Physical Features, Habitats, 

 Biographical Notes and Review of Fauna! Lists." All of these topics are 

 briefly covered and illustrated by portraits of several of the more prominent 

 ornithologists and a picture of the Westtown School in 1810. 



Part II consists of an annotated list of 247 species with a hypothetical 

 list of 16 more. Then follows a bibliography of 19 of the most important 

 county lists, published and manuscript, and a series of notes referred to by 

 numbers in the main text. A number of excellent half-tone reproductions 

 of photographs of nests, eggs and young birds of various species by Thomas 

 H. Jackson and Alfred C. Redfield illustrate this part. There are no keys 

 or descriptions whatever and there is no call for them in a work of this 

 kind, but the publisher in his advertising notice states that it contains 

 "complete descriptions of the 250 "bird species" of the County. With 

 this flagrant misstatement the author of course had nothing to do. 



The text under each species consists of the A. O. U. name, additional local 

 vernacular names, a careful statement of the character of its occurrence, 

 distribution and abundance in the county, and any important quotations 

 or references to the published literature. Also in the case of migrants 

 extreme dates of occurrence and averages covering the long period of Mr. 

 Burns' observations, with the exact dates of capture or observation of 

 rare species. The plan is excellent and but little published information 

 seems to have escaped the author. We fail however, to find mention of 

 the capture of the Brewster's Warbler (' Auk,' 1888, p. 115) or the observa- 

 tion of the Lawrence's Warbler (' Auk,' 1912, p. 247) in the county, both 



1 The Ornithology of Chester County, Pennsylvania. By Franklin Lorenzo Burns, 

 in co-operation with local ornithologists. Boston. Bichard G. Badger, The Gorham 

 Press. 1919, 8vo. pp. 1-122. 21 half-tone illustrations. Price $2.00 net. 



