Vol. XV : 
1900 aa Recent Literature. 75 
Fur Seal Commission (1896-97)! is a report on the birds by Mr. William 
' Palmer,” prepared from his own “experience and collections on the islands 
from May 27 to August 11, 1890, and partly from the published results of 
the visits of Mr. Henry W. Elliott, in 1872-73 and 1876,” and also on “the 
literature, the collections in the United States National Museum, and 
from the naturalists who have visited the group in recent years. Of the 
69 species here listed, 20 are apparently for the first time recorded from 
the islands, and a large amount of new and interesting information on 
the habits, changes of plumage, etc., is here for the first time published. 
The list, however, is necessarily “incomplete, as the winter-occurring 
birds have been little noted.”’ Mr. Palmer gives an account of the topo- 
graphy of the islands, in relation to its influence on the distribution of 
the birds, with a sketch of its ornithological history, including a formal 
bibliography of the subject. The geographical distribution of the Pribilof 
birds is analyzed at length (pp. 363-369), and there are several pages 
(pp- 369-372.) on their migration, in which Mr. Palmer gives a somewhat 
free rein to his imagination in supposing that the ancestors of the 
present bird population of the Pribilofs had, “in the remote geological 
past,” “a more happy course over contiguous land areas which have since 
been submerged,” to help them in their migratory journeys between the 
Aleutian and Hawaiian groups of islands. 
The list proper occupies pp. 373-427, and contains, besides full bibli- 
ographical references to the literature of the subject, usually extended 
notes on their habits, abundance, and distribution in the islands, and 
much valuable information upon the growth, character, and changes of 
plumage in many of the species. This, in the case of the Cormorant, 
affords basis for generalizations and hypotheses regarding the evolution 
of the Cormorant group. The genus Arexarfa receives extended notice, 
with the result that two species are recognized from North America, 
namely (1) A. zzterpres, the form of the Old World, found also in ‘“ west- 
ern Alaska from the Aleutians to Point Barrow”; also in Greenland. 
“Breeds from Japan and Alaska westward .around the more northern 
British Islands, Azores (?) [!], and Greenland.” (2) A. morinella, in 
1The Fur Seals and Fur Seal Islands of the North Pacific Ocean. By 
David Starr Jordan, President of Leland Stanford Jr. University, Commis- 
sioner in charge of Fur-Seal Investigations of 1896-97. With the following 
Official Associates: Leonhard Stejneger and Frederic A. Lucas, of the U.S. 
National Museum; Jefferson F. Moser, Lieutenant-Commander, U.S. N., in 
command of the U.S. Commission Steamer ‘ Albatross’; Charles H. Town- 
send, of the U. S. Fish Commission; George A. Clark, Secretary and Stenog- 
rapher; Joseph Murray, Special Agent. With special papers by other con- 
tributors. Washington: Government Printing Office. 1898 [=1899]. 4 vols., 
4to., with numerous maps, plates, aud text illustrations. 
2 Of. cit., Part ILI, 1899, pp. 355-431, pll. xxxviii-xli. 
