TO THE READER. 



In speaking of the common names of birds, I would draw 

 a sharp line between the English names recognized by the 

 text books and the American Ornithologists' Union, and the 

 purely local titles. Local names, whether of flowers or 

 birds, are often a hindrance to exact knowledge, because 

 they frequently stand for more than one object. For 

 example, I have heard the term Redbird applied alike to 

 the Baltimore Oriole, Scarlet Tanager, and Cardinal ; but a 

 knowledge of the recognized common names of a bird will 

 enable the student to find its species in any of the manuals. 



Allowing that you wish to name the birds, do not be held 

 back by minor considerations. You are not to be excluded 

 from the pleasures of this acquaintance even if you are 

 obliged to spend most of your life in the city. The bird- 

 quest will lend a new attraction to your holidays, and you 

 will be led toward the nearest park or along the front of 

 river or harbour. Bradford Torrey gives, in his inimitable 

 way, an account of the birds (some seventy species) which 

 he saw on Boston Common, and Frank M. Chapman lists 

 one hundred and thirty odd species which he has seen in 

 Central Park, New York. 1 



The museums also are open to you, and their treasury oi 

 skilfully preserved birds offers the advantage of close 

 inspection. The taxidermist's art has reached great per- 

 fection lately, and in the place of bird mummies, stuffed and 

 mounted each in the stiff attitude of its neighbour, without 

 the tribal marks of pose or expression, as much alike as 

 the f our-and-twenty blackbirds that were baked in the pie, 

 we now see the birds as individuals in their homes. The 

 American Museum of Natural History, New York, has sixty 

 such bird groups which show the Chimney Swift, nesting 

 on his little bracket, the Euffed Grouse rustling through 

 the leaves with her tiny brown chicks, the Baltimore Oriole 

 and its swinging nest, or the Black Duck guarding its bed 



1 Mr. Chapman, Assistant Curator of the Department of Birds and Mam- 

 mals of the Museum of Natural History, has recently completed an excel- 

 lent Visitor's Guide to the Museum's Collection of Birds, found within fifty 

 miles of New York City, in which all birds seen in Central Park are spe- 

 cially noted. 



xiv 



