134. BRITISH BIRDS. [VOL. XI. 
be referred to as ‘‘ a work on British Birds, with 200 coloured 
engravings, now in the course of publicaticn.” * 
It may be noted that, in Vol. IT, two pages, in sequence, are 
numbered 352, and that, in Vol. III, p. 115 is wrongly 
numbered 151. There are several other typographical errors 
in the book: e.g. Vol. I, p. 157, line 11: Tawy for Tawny ; 
Vol. II, p. 325, line 4: sits for sets; and Vol. III, p. 9, line 
15: companious for companions. The tallest uncut copy 
which I have seen is that in the Norwich Public Library, 
which measures 813 in. by 5} in.; the plates, however, 
are about ? in. less in length than the text. 
It has been suggested that Hunt did not write the letter- 
press of his British Ornithology, but I do not agree with this 
suggestion. The statement that Archdeacon Coxe wrote the 
text—on the authority of a note by Professor Newton (in his 
copy of the British Ornithology now in the Newton Library, 
Cambridge) that Joseph Clarke of Saffron Walden had been 
told this by Griffin or Hunt himself—is manifestly absurd, 
since the Archdeacon could only have been a boy of fifteen 
when the book was published. Moreover, Mr. A. R. Grand 
has stated that his grandfather was always beforehand with 
the text, but was delayed by the trouble and expense of 
producing the plates. It is known that Hunt undoubtedly 
supplied the “List of Birds” in the General History of 
Norfolk, and personally I believe that he was wholly responsible 
for the letterpress of his British Ornithology. This opinion is 
strengthened by the fact that the same literary style is 
traceable in both these works and also in his pamphlet, A 
Letter... to his friend Mr. John Skippon, which he wrote 
from America in 1834. It may here be stated that Hunt's 
British Ornithology displays no little originality and shows a 
good knowledge of the contemporary ornithological works. 
Many of the alternative English names given for the birds are 
very curious and testify in themselves to the research of the 
author. It is curious to note that in 1815 (the date on the 
title-page of Vol. I of the British Ornithology) another work 
on Birds was published, anonymously, in East Anglia, viz. : 
The Natural History of Birds, from the works of the best authors, 
antient and modern: . . . Intwo volumes: printed at Bungay. 
The work is manifestly a mere compilation and the coloured 
plates are very inferior to those by Hunt, but it is remarkable 
that it contains passages very similar to those in Hunt’s 
work and that in both works the same quotations from 
other writers on birds have been made. 
* A General History of the County of Norfolk . .. Printed by and 
for John Stacy, Vol. I., 1829, p. lviii. 
