Letters, Extracts, Notices, 8^c. 627 



and, as 1 am an '' old-world •" ornithologistj I am quite willing 

 to bow to tlie more modern lights. 



And now in respect to Mr. Ogilvie Grant^s second point — 

 namely, the Petrels. 



As Mr. Grant is aware, in April 1844 Mr. Gould described 

 ten new species of the family '^ Procellariidse.^'' In this paper 

 reference is made to Puffinus asshnilis, which he describes as 

 " breeding on the eastern coast of Australia and on Norfolk 

 Island." This I imagine to be the bird which is exercising 

 Mr. Grant^s lucubrations. The local names of the native 

 Petrels in Madeira are the Cagarra, the Eoeiro, the Pintainho, 

 the Angiuho, and the Roque de Castro. Dr. Heineken, Sir 

 W. Jardine, and others have variously described them. The 

 unravelling of synonyms is a puzzling task entailed upon 

 successive ornithologists by their predecessors. Blessed is the 

 man who lacks the scribendi-cacoethic bump, and whose 

 ambition does not run after the fatal adjunct of " mihi '^ to 

 an indefinite number of species which he holds to be " new 

 to science ''•' ! 



I was as much puzzled as well could be by the nomen- 

 clature of the Madeiran Petrels, but I had the advantage of 

 being able to resort to my good old friend Mr. Yarrell, who 

 abhorred, like the honest naturalist that he was, any useless 

 or self-seeking multiplication of synonyms. 



I may perhaps be allowed to remind Mr. Grant of YarrelFs 

 judgment upon the point he is at present raising. 



In writing to Mr. Edward Newman in ' The Zoologist ' 

 (June 14th, 1853), Mr. Yarrell says: — ''Having carefully 

 examined specimens of this bird from Australia, others from 

 Madeira, and compared these with the recently-acquired 

 example from Valentia Harbour, I am induced to consider 

 them but as one species ; and that the Puffinus obscurus of 

 Mr. Gould's ' Birds of Europe ■* and the Puffinus assimilis of 

 his 'Birds of Australia^ are accordingly identical." 



I have only to add my apologies for the length of this 

 letter, and am. 



Yours &c., 



E. W. Harcourt. 

 2u2 



