484 Notes and News. |" Auk 



LOct . 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



Henry Baker Tristram, Canon of Durham, a Corresponding Fellow 

 of the American Ornithologists' Union, died at his home in Durham, Eng- 

 land, March 8, 1906, at the age of 83 years and 10 months. He was born 

 at Eglingham, near Alnwick, May 11, 1822, and was graduated from Lin- 

 coln College, Oxford, in 1844, and became Canon of Durham in 1873. He 

 was ordained a deacon in 1845, and a priest in 1846; owing to ill health, 

 " he was ordered abroad, and passed two years (1847-1849) as naval and 

 military chaplain in Bermuda." 



In 1855-1857 he spent two winters in Algeria, and in 1858 made his first 

 journey to Palestine, which country he many times revisited, his last visit 

 being made in 1897. Although distinguished as an ornithologist, and 

 especially as an authority on the birds of Palestine, he was also the author 

 of several books of travel and general works on Palestine, including its 

 fauna and flora, geography, geology, etc. But his ornithological interest 

 was not restricted to a single region, as is evidenced by his large general 

 collection of birds, which, when turned over to the Free Public Museums 

 of Liverpool in 1896, numbered 20,000 specimens, referable to 6000 spe- 

 cies, and contained 150 types. About, the same time his large collection 

 of eggs ' ' was disposed of to the late Philip Crowley, of Waddon House, Croy- 

 don," and on Crowley's death, in 1901, became the property of the British 

 Museum. He did not, however, cease collecting, and at the time of his 

 death had amassed a second collection of nearly 6000 specimens, notably 

 rich in oceanic and other rare birds, and which has recently been pur- 

 chased by the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. 



Canon Tristram was one of the Founders and original Members of the 

 British Ornithologists' Union, and throughout his subsequent life was a 

 frequent contributor of valuable papers to 'The Ibis,' and to other natu- 

 ral history journals. His principal works, based on his explorations, are 

 'The Great Sahara: Wanderings South of the Atlas Mountains' (1860); 

 'The Land of Israel; a Journal of Travels in Palestine, undertaken with 

 special reference to its physical character' (1865); 'The Land of Moab' 

 (1873); 'The Fauna and Flora of Palestine ' (1884). 



Victor Fatio, a Corresponding Fellow of the American Ornithologist's 

 Union, whose death has already been announced in this journal (antea, 

 p. 356), was a leading authority on the vertebrate fauna of Switzerland! 

 being the author of the ' Faune des Vertebres de la Suisse,' the second 

 volume of which, issued in two parts (1S00 and 1904) in quarto, and em- 

 bracing nearly two thousand pages of text and many text illustrations, is 

 devoted to the birds of Switzerland. He was born in Geneva in 1838, and 

 appears to have spent most of his life in Switzerland, where he received 

 his preliminary education, and later studied at the Universities of Berlin 



