572 Recently published Ornithological Works. 



a recent number of ' Indian Museum Notes.' The author 

 points out that birds are destroyed in large quantities in 

 India for two purposes only — (1) for the sake of tlieir skins 

 or feathers ; (2) for eating — and expatiates under botli these 

 heads. 



The principal birds killed for their feathers are the Egrets, 

 Herodias alba, H. intermedia, and H. garzetta, which are 

 much valued for their breeding-trains. Their skins are sold 

 and exported " in very large quantities." 



112. Sharpe and Grant on the Picarice. 



[Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum. Volume XVII. 

 Catalogue of the Picariae in the Collection of the British Museum. 

 Coraciae and Ilalcyones, with the families Leptosomatidse, Coraciidse, 

 Meropidae, Alcedinidje, Momotidae, Todida?, and Coliidae, by R. 

 Bowdler Sharpe. Bucerotes and Trogones, by W. B. Ogilvie Grant. 

 London: 1892.] 



The issue of the 17th volume of the ' Catalogue of Birds ' 

 renders the first twenty volumes of this great work complete, 

 and the whole of the Orders Accipitres, Striges, Passeres, 

 Picarise, and Psittaci are thus finished. The present volume, 

 prepared partly by Dr. Bowdler Sharpe and partly by Mr. 

 Ogilvie Grant, as shown on the second titlepage, " contains 

 an account of the remaining families of the suborder 

 Coracise, as understood by Seebohm, as well as those of the 

 Halcyones, Bucerotes, and Trogones.'^ In these three 

 suborders there are nine families, containing altogether 397 

 species. These are represented in the British Museum 

 Collection by 7904 specimens, showing the large average 

 of nearly 20 specimens to each species. Only 16 of the 

 recognized species are unrepresented in the Museum. 



Dr. Sharpe commences the volume with the Leptoso- 

 matidae, Coraciidse, and Meropidse — the three remaining 

 families of Coracise, according to the arrangement here 

 adopted. We observe that he maintains his Evrystomi 

 IcBtior and calonyx as distinct, in which, however, other 

 authorities do not agree with him^. The suborder Halcyones, 



* Cf. Dresser, Ibis, 1891, p. 99. 



