PREFACE. IX 



He then proceeds to make a somewhat startling comparison 

 as to the number of generic names which figure in my volumes 

 of the ''Catalogue of Birds," viz., 108, as compared with 

 those written by my coadjutors, Mr. Seebohm and Dr. Gadow, 

 "neither of whom invented a single new genus," Mr. Osbert 

 Salvin (one), Mr. Edward Hargitt (four), Captain Shelley (five), 

 Mr. Ogilvie-Grant (six), Count Salvadori (twelve),* " while Dr. 

 Sharpe in 10^ volumes has favoured us with 108 new genera. 

 It is obvious that the ' genus-standard ' of Dr. Sharpe must be 

 very different from that of Messrs. Hargitt, Seebohm, Salva- 

 dori, and others, who, in 9^ volumes, have been content with 

 28 new genera, as against his 108." A more manifestly un- 

 fair method of comparison could hardly be conceived, and I 

 wonder at Canon Tristram attempting to prove his point by 

 means of the above figures. Mr. Seebohm worked out the 

 Thrushes and Warblers, a well-worn field, over much of which 

 he had travelled in print, before he wrote Vol. V. of the "Cata- 

 logue." Dr. Gadow's volumes dealt with Paridfe, Laniidce, 

 Nectariniida, Meliphagida, all of which had been much 

 studied and written about before he undertook this portion 

 of the "Catalogue." Captain Shelley, for instance, had just 

 completed a Monograph of the Nectar iniidce. The Shrikes 

 and Tits had received much attention from several ornitholo- 

 gists, and Count Salvadori and Dr. Meyer had already swept 

 the board of such new genera as might have fallen to Dr. 

 Gadow's share in the Meliphagida, by publishing a number of 

 new genera not long before the latter commenced to work at 

 the " Catalogue." Mr. Salvin's volume consisted mainly of 

 the Humming Birds (Trochilida)^ and it is wonderful that he 

 even found one new genus to characterise, seeing that the 

 family had been monographed over and over again, by 



* To have been quite fair, Canon Tristram should have added two new 

 genera of Swifts (out of nine ! ) published in Mr. Hartert's half volume. 



