216 Letters, Extracts^ and Notes. [Ibis, 



they are most distinctive, especially as regards the ground- 

 colour, shape, and size. 



P. F, BUNYARD. 



57 Kiddermiuster Road, 



Croydou. 



24 October, 1921. 



Bird-Migration and the Marking Method. 



Sir,— May I be allowed to reply briefly to Mr. H. W. 

 E/obinsou's letter in tlie last number of ' The Ibis,"" com- 

 menting on my paper on "Bird-Migration and the Marking 

 Method " ? Among other things, I must register a modest 

 disavowal of any claim to the title " Professor " which he 

 bestows upon me! 



It would be easy to add to Mr. Robinson's list of 

 "omissions" from my paper, but I do not now wish to 

 do more than correct any impression that my account 

 of the Aberdeen University results was intended as a 

 complete summary of the subject in general. My slun-t 

 digression on the history of the marking method indeed 

 admitted that similar work had been taken up " in other 

 parts of the Continent " not mentioned in further detail, 

 and the li>t of published papers gave merely references 

 relevant to the text and was in no sense an attempt at a 

 bibliography. Similarly, the references to the results of 

 other investigators were obviously and avowedly " by no 

 means exhaustive.'^ In particular, it was not thought 

 desirable to refer in any detail to the results of Mr. H. F. 

 Witlierby's ' British Birds ' scheme (to which Mr. Robinson's 

 great personal efforts have been an important contribution), 

 because the work is happily still in progress and will 

 doubtless lead to valuable amplifications — and perha])s 

 modifications — of the interim results, summarised and 

 otherwise, which have already been published. I should 

 be more than soi'ry, however, to have conveyed any false 

 impression of stinting admiration for so great an under- 

 taking, of which I indeed said that " the eventual 



