CLASSIFICATION. 51 



We hope that it may, but our hope is mingled with fear. After all, 

 however, every classification of living creatures made or attempted, 

 must be* to a certain extent, artificial ; as MACGILLIVBAY well 

 observes : " Species only exist in nature ; and genera, families, 

 orders, and all other groups, are merely ideal associations made 

 for convenience, and therefore more or less arbitrary." A system 

 of classification we must have, or how are we to arrange, in any- 

 thing like available order, the immense accumulation of facts 

 which preceding naturalists have collected, and to which additions 

 are daily being made? How are we to know where to look for 

 particulars of a distinct species, or to deposit a particular fact, 

 if there is no certain place assigned for it in the vast magazine 

 of natural history ; no class, no order of arrangement ? Like 

 the naturalist, Buffon, we would lay much greater stress on facts 

 than systems, but we would not, like him, abandon system alto- 

 gether, " because it aids the memory, and, if not conducted in a 

 manner altogether arbitrary, serves to show the actual inter-ap- 

 proximation of beings in nature itself."* Yes, a system we must 

 have, but why twenty different ones ? This is a great obstacle 

 to the study of natural history, and should be remedied. In this, 

 as well as in every branch of physical science, we want agree- 

 ment and uniformity in its professors and modes of instruction. 

 We know that there are, in the case of birds especially, obvious 

 difficulties in the way of one general method of classification, 

 and great temptation to multiply systems, but we trust that they 

 may be eventually overcome ; and in the mean time, "the only 

 alternative of the naturalist who desires to be useful is accuracy 

 of description. "f 



In " Selby's Illustrations of British Ornithology," 2 vols. 8vo., 

 will be found a well-arranged Synoptical Table of the Land and 

 Water Birds of Britain ; and attached to each species is a very 

 complete list of synonymes, and works from which they are taken, 

 extremely useful as references to the authorities which should be 

 consulted by the student in Ornithology, to whom may be re- 

 commended " Latham's General History of Birds;" "Donovan's 

 British Birds ;" " Selby's Complete British Ornithology ;" "Mudie's 

 Feathered Tribes of the British Islands;" "White's Natural 

 History of Selborne, edited by Jesse ;" and for Song Birds, espe- 

 cially, Bolton's beautifully illustrated " History of British Song 

 Birds." 



According to MACGILLIVEAT, the list of British Birds may be 

 divided as follows : Permanently resident and breeding species, 

 143 ; summer birds which breed with us, 44 ; winter residents, 36 ; 

 stragglers from the north, 23 ; stragglers from the south and east, 

 55 ; stragglers from the west, 19 ; total number of species, 320. 

 * Griffith's Cuvier, vol. vi. p. 95. t Ibid. 



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