264 Notes and News. \_fvty 



Dr. Alexander Theodor von Middendorff, a Corresponding 

 Member of the American Ornithologists' Union, died at his estate in 

 Hellenonn, Livcland, Russia, Jan. 2S, 1894, at the age of nearly 79 years. 

 He was born at St. Petersburg, Aug. 18, 1S15, and studied at Dorpat, 

 taking his University degree in 1837. He afterward pursued his studies 

 at the Universities of Berlin, Erlangen and Breslau, and later at the Uni- 

 versity of Kiew. 



Dr. Middendorf is well known to naturalists everywhere for his great 

 work, 'Reise in den aufssersten Norden und Osten Sibiriens' (four 

 volumes, quarto, 1S47-59), as remarkable for the erudition displayed as 

 for the breadth of the field covered by his investigations. His other 

 principal ornithological publication is his well-known 'Die Isepiptesen 

 Russlands. Grundlagen zur Erforschung der zugzeiten und zugrichtun- 

 gen der Vogel Russlands' (1855). He wrote also extensively on mammals 

 and on mollusks. 



Dr. Leopold von Schrenck, a Corresponding member of the 

 American Ornithologists' Union, died Jan. 20, 1894, aged 68 years. Dr. 

 Schrenck is perhaps best known to ornithologists for his work entitled 

 'Reisen und Forschungen im Amur-Lande in den Jahren 1S54-56,' in two 

 quarto volumes, 1858-60, over 350 pages of volume I being devoted to 

 birds. He was born at Dorpat, April 24, 1826, and at the time of his 

 death was Director of the Ethnological Museum of the Royal Academy of 

 Sciences at St. Petersburg. His name is naturally associated with those 

 of two other celebrated Russian explorers and naturalists — Dr. von 

 Middendorff and Dr. Gustav Radde — who at nearly the same time were 

 exploring Asiatic Russia, and whose works may be well termed 'epoch- 

 making' as regards the ornithology of this previously little known region. 



'Foreign Finches in Captivity,' by Arthur G. Butler, Ph.D., etc., is 

 announced for public. ition in ten parts, royal quarto, with between 300 

 and 400 pages of text and sixty beautifully colored plates, the first part to 

 be issued June 15, and the remaining parts at intervals of six weeks. The 

 edition will be limited to 300 copies. The publishers are L. Reeve & Co., 

 6 Henrietta St., Covent Garden, London. 



Readers of 'The Auk' will be interested to know that Mr. Charles B. 

 Cory has recently sold his large collection of birds and his ornithological 

 library to the Field Columbian Museum of Chicago, in which institution 

 he has also accepted the Curatorship of the Department of Ornithology, 

 which is to be entirely under his direction. 



It may also be noted that Mr. William Brewster and Mr. Frank M. 

 Chapman returned about May 1 from their trip to the Island of Trinidad, 

 and the publication of the ornithological results of their work may soon 

 be expected. 



