722 Obituary. [Ibis, 



child, and was educated at Bath and also in France and 

 Germany. He passed into the Royal Military Academy at 

 Woolwich in 1860, and two years later obtained a com- 

 mission in the Royal Artillery. 



He served for several years in England, and in 1867 

 was stationed at Melbourne in Australia, which was then 

 garrisoned with Imperial troops. From 1868 to 1877 he was 

 in Ceylon, and it was during his service in this island that 

 most of his ornithological work was done. He made large 

 collections of birds and travelled extensively throughout the 

 island, and also reorganized the Colombo Museum. He 

 returned to England in 1877, and in 1883 he retired from 

 the Imperial service with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, 

 having been appointed by the Tasmanian Government 

 Commandant of the local military forces of that island. 

 He held this post from 1883 to 1890 and again from 1898 

 to 1902, when he finally retired and settled on his ancestral 

 estate. 



The earliest of Legge's publications in ornithology which 

 we have found is a letter to ' The Ibis' of 1866 remarking 

 oil the abundance of nesting Redshanks in south-east Essex, 

 and is dated from Shoeburyness, where he was no doubt 

 quartered at that time. From 1874 to 1878 he communi- 

 cated several papers and notices to ' The Ibis ' on Ceylonese 

 birds and their distribution especially in the hilly region in 

 the south of the island, and this culminated in the publi- 

 cation of the 'Birds of Ceylon,' a large quarto volume of 

 1238 pages with 34 plates illustrating the birds peculiar 

 to the island and a map showing the faunal districts. This 

 work, which was issued in three parts between 1878 and 

 1880, was well received and much praised at the time of its 

 issue, and was reckoned one of the most complete and suc- 

 cessful monographs of a limited avifauna. It is still the 

 standard work on Ceylon birds and has not been superseded. 

 For the preparation of this work Col. Legge amassed a fine 

 collection of Ceylonese birds, a large proportion of which he 

 presented to the National Museum at South Kensington. 



After his return to Tasmania he sent a short paper to 



