Vol ionQ VI Tl Recent Literature. 89 



1909 



RECENT LITERATURE. 



Chapman's ' Camps and Cruises of an Ornithologist.' ' — Says the author: 

 "During the past seven years, with the assistance of artist and prepara- 

 teur, I have devoted the nesting season of birds to collecting specimens 

 and making field studies and photographs on which to base a series of 

 what have been termed 'Habitat Groups' of North American birds for 

 the American Museum of Natural History. These groups," it is further 

 stated, "are designed to illustrate not only the habits and haunts of the 

 birds shown, but also the country in which they live." The groups, there- 

 fore, contain not only the birds, with their nests and young, placed in a 

 facsimile reproduction of their original surroundings, but the background 

 forms an accurate panoramic representation of the adjoining country. 

 Thus is shown not only the character of the immediate location of the nest, 

 .but a considerable area characteristic of the haunts of the species, repro- 

 duced from studies by the artist on the spot, aided by photographs. Thus 

 are introduced various types of physiographic conditions, which render 

 the groups geographically as well as ornithologically instructive. They 

 are unrivalled by any similar reproductions elsewhere, no expense having 

 been spared to secure accuracy of detail, while the panoramic backgrounds, 

 some of them nearly thirty feet in length, give ample space for compre- 

 hensive scenic effects. 



The assembling of all this material entailed extensive journeys, and the 

 results accurately portray strikingly diverse types of country, ranging from 

 subtropical scenes in the Bahamas and the Everglades of Florida to the 

 deserts of Arizona, the prairies and badlands of Nebraska and Wyoming, 

 the irrigated lands of interior California, the marshy lakes of Oregon, and 

 the alpine summits of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta, as well as marshes 

 and cliffs nearer home. To quote again from the author's preface: "No 

 ornithologist, I imagine, has ever pursued his calling with greater pleasure 

 and satisfaction than I have experienced in gathering the material and 

 data for these groups of birds. Not only has it been my fortune to behold 

 some of the most interesting and remarkable sights in the world of birds, 

 but it has been my privilege to have them reproduced in so admirable a 

 manner that they convey to others a wholly adequate conception of the 

 scene itself." The purpose of the present book is "now further to perpet- 

 uate these experiences and studies by telling the story of the various ex- 

 peditions of which the groups were the objects, adding such information 

 concerning the birds observed as seems worthy of record, and illustrating 



1 Camps and Cruises | of an | Ornithologist | By | Frank M. Chapman | Curator of 

 Ornithology, American Museum of Natural History | Fellow of the American Ornithol- 

 ogists' Union; Author of | "Handbook of Birds of Eastern North America" | "Bird- 

 Life"; "Bird Studies with | a Camera," etc. | With 250 photographs from Nature | 

 by the Author | New York | D. Appleton and Company | 1908 — 8vo, pp. xvi + 432, 

 with 2.50 half-tone illustrations. Noveniber, 1908. $3.00 net. 



