Recently published Ornithological Works. 173 



232 species. Much stress is laid, in the prefatory remarks, 

 upon the serious decrease of bird-life in France of late years, 

 which, however, looking to the passion for gibier which pre- 

 vails so widely in that country, is hardly to be wondered at. 



17. Onstalet on the Birds of Patagonia. 



[Mission scientifique de Cap Horn 1882-1883. Tom. VI. Zoologie. 

 Oiseaux, par E. Oustalet. 1vol. 4to. Paris: 1891.] 



This most useful volume on the birds of Southern Pata- 

 gonia, Tierra del Fuego, and the Falkland Islands is based 

 primarily upon the rich collections made by Dr. Hyades, 

 Dr. Hahn, and M. Savinet, of the French Government Mis- 

 sion to Cape Horn. At the same time M. Oustalet has 

 studied the birds collected in Southern Patagonia by M. Le- 

 brun and the officers of the ' Volage.^ In order to render 

 the work as complete as possible, however, the author has 

 referred to all the previous authorities upon the same subject, 

 and has thus vastly increased the value of his results. We 

 have, in fact, in this volume a complete account of the present 

 state of our knowledge of the ornis of Antarctic America. 



M. Oustalet first discusses the species of which specimens 

 were actually obtained by the French voyageurs. These are 

 102 in number, mostly well-known species, concerning which, 

 however, many new facts and observations are given. Two 

 species of this series are considered as new discoveries — 

 Pseudochloris lebruni and. Tinamotis ingoufi [cf. Ibis, 1890, 

 p. 453). A large Snipe is referred to GaUinago 7iobilis, Scl. ; 

 but the large species previously obtained in Tierra del Fuego 

 is G. strickhmdi {cf. Scl. et Salv. Ex. Orn. p. 196), not G. no- 

 bilis, Avhicli, so far as we know, is only found iu Colombia 

 and Ecuador. The vexed question of the Loggerhead Ducks 

 is discussed at full length, and the decision is arrived at that 

 there are two different species — Microptei'us cinereus and 

 M. patachonicus. Three examples of the very interesting 

 small Penguin, Microdyptes serresianus, were obtained by the 

 Cape- Horn Mission, and this species may consequently be 

 added to the Neotropical Avifauna. 



