PREFACE. V. 



his own luxuriant fancy, has been too frequently hurried into 

 the wild paths of conjecture and romance. The late Mr. 

 White, of Selborne, has added much to the general stock 

 of knowledge on this delightful subject, by attentively and 

 faithfully recording whatever fell under his own observation, 

 and by liberal communications to others. 



As far as we could, consistently with the plan laid down 

 in the following work, we have consulted, and we trust with 

 some advantage, the works of Willoughby, Ray, and other 

 naturalists. In the arrangement of the various classes, as 

 well as in the descriptive part, we have taken as guides 

 our intelligent and indefatigable countrymen, Pennant and 

 Latham,* to whose elegant and useful labours the world is 

 indebted for a fund of the most rational entertainment, and 

 who wilt be remembered by every lover of Nature as long 

 as her works have power to charm. The communications 

 with which we have been favoured by those gentlemen who 

 were so good as to notice our growing work, have been 

 generally acknowledged, each in its proper place; it remains 

 only that we be permitted to insert this testimony of our 

 grateful sense of them. 



In a few instances we have ventured to depart from the 

 usual method of classification :f by placing the hard-billed 

 birds, or those which live chiefly on seeds, next to those of 

 the Pie kind, there seems to be a more regular gradation 

 downwards, since only a few anomalous birds such as the 

 Cuckoo, Hoopoe, Nuthatch, &c., intervene. The soft-billed 

 birds, or those which subsist chiefly on worms, insects, and 

 such like, are by this mode placed altogether, beginning 

 witli those of the Lark kind. To this we must observe that 

 by dividing the various families of birds into two grand 



* The works of Col. Montagu have also been consulted in pre- 

 paring the later editions for the press. 



t These remarks on classification, relate to the author's arrange- 

 ment in the previous editions of this work. 



