1891.1 Recoif Literature. 18 1 



pensable for the minute stiidj wliich is to he our portion iti tlie not very 

 distant future." (Doubtless Dr. Sharpe is not unaware that these impor- 

 tant factors have already received mucli attention in some quarters, hav- 

 ing in fact been uppermost in the minds of many American students for 

 the last two decades at least.) 



Dr. Sharpe then proceeds to develop and illustrate his own ideas of the 

 classification of birds and their arrangement by means of his "ideal 

 museum," in elaborating which he has frequent recourse to habits, man- 

 ner of nesting, character of the eggs, mode of roosting, the character of 

 the nestling in respect to clothing, etc., in deciding points of aiTinity ^nd 

 relationship, as well as to strictly anatomical characters. Each leading 

 group of the non-Passerine birds is in turn reviewed and located; the 

 Passeres, having been recently treated by him in a special paper, arc 

 briefly disposed of by the correction of the position of a few genera and 

 families in the light of later discoveries. His views of the relationships 

 of the various subdivisions of the Oscines is, however, diagrammaticall}' 

 expressed in Plate XI. 



Then follows in linear sequence a tabular list of the higher groups and 

 their families, with diagnoses in footnotes, illustrated by a diagram 

 showing comparatively the system of the author and those of Fiirbringer 

 and Seebohm. He puts forward his scheme as of course a tentative one, 

 in the hope of being able to renew the attack at some future time. It 

 differs at many points from any of its predecessors, whether for the 

 better or for the worse is beyond the scope of the present notice to in- 

 cj_uire. The number of orders is 34, and of suborders 78. He concludes 

 this masterly address — in which throughout he skilfully imparts a certain 

 charm to a strictly technical subject — with a few personal reminiscences 

 of interest to the systematic ornithologist. — J. A. A. 



Hornaday's Handbook of Taxidermy and Zoological Collecting.* — 

 Taxidermy, the handrnaid of Zoology, has already become one of the fine 

 arts, requiring the skill and other qualities of both the sculptor and the 

 painter, and capable of yielding results comparable with the master- 

 pieces of either. The expert collector, and still more the skilled taxi- 

 dermist, is the indispensable ally of the professional naturalist and the 

 museum-builder. On the intelligence and alertness of the former and 



*Taxidermy | and | Zoological Collecting | A Complete Handbook for the Ama- 

 teur Taxidermist, I Collector, Osteologist, Museum Builder, | Sportsman and Trav- 

 eller I By I William T. Hornaday | For eight years Chief Taxidermist of the U. S. 

 National Museum ; for seven years | Zoological Collector and Taxidermist for 

 Ward's Natural Science Establish- | ment; late Superintendent of the National Zoo- 

 logical Park; | author of 'Two Years in the Jungle,' etc. | With Chapters on | Col- 

 lecting and Preserving Insects | By W. J. Holland, Ph.D., D.D. | Chancellor 

 Western University of Pennsylvania; .... [=3 lines titles.] j Illustrated by Charles 

 Bradford Hudson | and other Artists | 24 Plates and 85 Text Illustnations | New 

 York I Charles Scribner's Sons | 1891.— 8 vo. pp. xix-l-362. 



