work. We will mention a few of the more importan: 
132 Notice of Audubon’s Birds of America. 
We shall not, therefore, repeat those objections. We will only re- 
mark that we see nothing in the present volume to induce us to 
change our opinion ; nothing to make good to us the loss of the 
usual division into orders ; nothing to reconcile us to the countless 
subdivisions into genera on grounds that, to our eyes, seem mere — 
specific differences. If any genus would justify this subdivi 
ion, it is the old and immensely large one of Sylvia. B 
in this case, large as it is, in point of numbers, than to subdi- 
vide it into genera with so little perceptible variation one from 
another, as exist in the generic characters of -Myiodioctes, Syl- 
vicola, Trichas, Helinaia, Mniotilta, &c. &c.; and certainly, it 
is far better than to create such specific genera as the last. We 
have, however, only our regret to express. We intend to con- 
vey no censure for the adoption of this perplexing system, hav- 
ing already explained why it was, to some extent, hardly a 
matter of choice with the author. Of the seventy species de- 
scribed in the second volume, no less than twenty six are not to 
be found in the work of Wilson, and of these, seventeen are to 
be found in no other works on American ornithology than compet 
of Mr. Audubon. 
Besides these important discoveries of new species, the work 
embodies a large number of interesting, important and novel facts 
with regard to old species. In some instances where differences 
arising from age and sex have been the means of deceiving natu- ? 
ralists, and leading them to divide one species into two or more, 
these mistakes have been detected and pointed out in = posed 
The bird described as a new species by aadbbeaed in the first 
iraluinetat Ornithological Biography, as Muscicapa Selbit, is the 
young of the hooded warbler, ape cuculata of W ilson; and 
S&S. mitrata of Bonaparte. 
. The Sylvia Vigorsii of the same fies been ascertained to be wa 
anew species, but the young of the pine-creeping warbler, saa 
“ia. pimus of authors. 
The Sylvia autumnalis of Wilson, Bonaparte, Nuttall, Audu- 
bon aid jal others, is pronounced to be the young of the hemlock 
warbler, Sylvia parus. We must confess we are somewhat stag- 
gered at this annuneiation, and although we doubt not the writer 
believes he had good grounds for his decision in the case, we 
