152 Notes and News. [j a u n . 



county of Illinois, and more than 30 miles of shore line of Lake Michigan 

 has been set aside as a sanctuary for wild animals and birds. This news 

 comes when we here in South Australia are fighting hard to show the 

 'powers that be' the necessity of setting aside an area of poor country 

 on Kangaroo Island for the same purpose, and shame be it to South 

 Australia that there are no such parks or reserves in this State as there are 

 in America and even approaching those now existing in other States of the 

 Commonwealth . ' ' 



Few countries in the world possess the bird fauna that Southern Australia 

 has, as any complete ornithological work with colored plates of all the 

 species will demonstrate. Even such an admirable little work as 'An 

 Australian Bird Book ' by Dr. J. A. Leach, with its plain and colored figures, 

 gives a fine realization of the extraordinary avifauna of that great island 

 continent. We find no Humming Birds, Vultures or Woodpeckers, to be 

 sure, but an enormous array of nearly 400 species of everything else known 

 to the Class Aves, including such archaic types as the Emu, Lyrebird, 

 Moundbuilders, and so on. A very large percentage of the forms are of 

 wonderfully varied and brilliant plumage, especially among the Kingfishers, 

 Rollers, Cockatoos, Parrots, Chats, Regents, Honey-eaters, Diamond 

 Birds, and many others. 



It is greatly to be hoped that the government will give heed to such 

 earnest appeals to it as have been made by such distinguished and far- 

 seeing ornithologists as Captain White, Dr. Leach and not a few others 

 among Australian scientists and sincere lovers of all that nature offers 

 in that grand old sunny continent of the Southern Hemisphere. 



R. W. Shufeldt. 



Washington, D. C, 28th November, 1918. 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



In a discussion of nomenclature in 'The Auk' for October, 1918, p. 508, 

 the writer referred to a "list of proposed changes and additions to the 

 'Check List' compiled by Dr. H. C. Oberholser and embodying the com- 

 piler's opinions upon certain of the cases." 



This sentence seems to have been interpreted by some readers as a 

 reflection upon Dr. Oberholser by charging him with inserting in a list 

 of "proposed changes" a personal opinion as to the advisability of the 

 changes. No such criticism was intended and while the writer sees no 

 reason why Dr. Oberholser should not have added such opinion, neverthe- 

 less, he did not do so, and the writer was misled by certain opinions already 

 published elsewhere and quoted in these lists. 



