Vol '5i9 XVI ] Recent Literature. 433 



The Shetland Starling is added at the end of the introductory note and 

 other emendations are made on the cover, all of which will be properly 

 incorporated in an appendix in the last part of the work. 



Illustrations are numerous but are intended, as is explained, solely as 

 an aid to identification. They are mainly line cuts of heads, bills and feet, 

 etc., and there is one excellent colored plate of the " juvenile " plumages 

 of various finches. 



We shall look forward with interest to the succeeding parts of this 

 important work which should easily become the authoritative book of 

 reference upon the British avifauna. — W. S. 



Harris's ' Birds of the Kansas City Region.' — Mr. Harry Harris, 

 already well known to the readers of ' The Auk ' through his historical 

 articles on Auduboniana, Harris's Sparrow, etc., has prepared an admirable 

 annotated fist of the birds of the vicinity of Kansas City, Mo., 1 where he 

 has resided for many years. The list treats mainly of Jackson County, 

 Mo., but includes also Clay and Platte Counties in that state as well as 

 Johnson County, Kansas and some notes from other adjacent territory. 



Under each species is given a brief general statement of the character of 

 its occurrence and then follows an account of its distribution, migration, 

 etc., and some information upon habits, running sometimes to half a page or 

 even more. At the end is a list of species arranged according to time of 

 occurrence, with migrants in order of their arrival in the spring; and also 

 an excellent bibliography. 



Mr. Harris's writings are characterized by their high literary quality and 

 great care in editing, and we only wish that all writers would follow his 

 example in these respects. 



The paper is a welcome contribution to the ornithology of a region that 

 has not received much detailed attention in the past and it should do much 

 to stimulate bird study throughout the Kansas City region. As a com- 

 position and a piece of printing it may well be taken as a model by those 

 contemplating similar lists. 



There is one point which calls for comment and that is the quotation of 

 the names given in the ' Lists of Proposed Changes in the A. O. U. Check- 

 List ' which are published each year in ' The Auk,' although the author 

 is to be commended for giving them only as alternates to the names in the 

 last edition of the ' Check-List.' Curiously enough he seems to have 

 entirely misunderstood these lists and quotes the names as " proposed " 

 at the dates on which the lists were published. They are simply changes 

 " proposed " by various writers at various times prior to the issue of the 

 list, but usually during the pre vious year, and are brought together simply 

 for the convenience of the A. O. U. Committee and others who wish to 



1 Birds of the Kansas City Region, Harry Harris. Transactions of the Academy of 

 Science of St. Louis. Vol. XXIII, No. 8., pp. 219-371. Issued February 27, 1919. With 

 an introduction (pp. 213-218) by Ralph Hoffmann. 



