V ?S 9 f *] Notes and News. 263 



exhausted his strength and made it desirable to seek other climates, pre- 

 vented the accomplishment of this desire. He went out again collecting, 

 this time to Southern Arizona and Mexico, where, in spite of adverse 

 circumstances, he continued his work and observations, helped by his 

 faithful wife who shared the hardships and privations of these expeditions, 

 till she finally closed his eyes in Tucson. The notes made during their 

 stay in Mexico he was enabled to work up into a paper entitled 'Notes on 

 Birds of Central Mexico, with Descriptions of Forms believed to be New' 

 [see antea, p. 245], but he did not have the satisfaction of seeing it 

 published, as it was not issued until shortly after his death (Proc. U. S. 

 Nat. Mus., XVI, 1S94, pp. 771-791)- 



Aside from the external circumstances which prevented him from pub- 

 lishing often, or voluminously, there were internal causes which impaired 

 his literary productivity, viz., his artistic temperament and his varied 

 interests in so many branches of science and art, which conspired against 

 his becoming a narrow specialist. But this very thing made him so 

 valuable a collector for others. He was not of the kind that gathers the 

 stuff in by the bushel, or the ton, and to whom quantity is the first con- 

 sideration, quality the second. He collected with discrimination; his 

 preparation, particularly of the birds, was unexcelled ; and his notes were 

 full, to the point, and above all, reliable. Not until all the vast and 

 varied material he gathered in so many lands has been worked up will it 

 be fully appreciated how much science owes to the unpretentious, but 

 honest work of Pierre Louis Jouy. — L. S. 



William C. Avery, M. D., an Associate Member of the American 

 Ornithologists' Union, died at Greensboro', Hall County, Alabama, 

 March 11, 1S94, at the age of sixty-two years. Dr. Avery was a graduate 

 of Burlington College, Burlington, New Jersey, and later pursued his 

 medical studies in both Philadelphia and Paris, lie studied ornithology 

 purely for the love of it, and his contributions to the science were by no 

 means commensurate with his knowledge of it. His principal paper, 

 published under the initials "W. C. A.", was entitled 'Birds Observed in 

 Alabama,' and appeared in the 'American Field,' Vol. XXXIV, 1890, pp. 

 5S4, 607, 608; Vol. XXXV, 1S91, pp. S, 32, 55. It contains the results of 

 many years' close observation and is the most important paper relating to 

 the region of which it treats. 



Dr. Avery's services to science, however, are to be reckoned by the 

 assistance he gave fellow-workers rather than by his published writings. 

 An appeal for information or specimens always met with a readv and 

 enthusiastic response, and he sometimes made special trips to distant 

 parts of the State to procure specimens requested by some correspondent. 



Dr. Avery was a man of high classical and philological attainments and 

 our journals attest his aid in solving some of the etymological problems 

 which arise in zoological nomenclature. 



