Recently published Ornithological Works. 723 



into races. In other cases Mr. Jourdain heads his account 

 with a trinomial race-title, and this forces him to commit 

 such an absurdity as to call the common Serin Finch Serinus 

 canarius serinus, while he places the Greenland Redpoll 

 under the general title of Coues's Redpoll. Tautology is 

 quite a minor question. 



Among the many useful points in the work we may notice 

 the lists of local British and foreign names of the birds, the 

 references to other forms the range of which abuts upon the 

 European area, the measurements of the eggs, and the 

 determination of the approximate weight of the shells. 



It is of course impossible to avoid occasional slips, but we 

 must demur to the statements that Corvus comix tends to 

 replace C. corone in Northern Scotland, that the Chough 

 probably often lays its eggs at intervals, that the Goldfinch 

 uses a little moss in its nest, while we deny that the 

 Starling has become established as a breeding species in 

 Northumberland only within the last forty years. But 

 the comparative insignificance and infrequency of these 

 inaccuracies only strengthens our opinion of the general 

 accuracy of Mr. Jourdain's work. 



The plates by no means reach the standard of the text, 

 especially as regards coloration, but we hope to be able to 

 criticize them more favourably in future parts of the book. 



121. Journal of the South African Ornithologists Union. 



[The Journal of the South African Ornithologists' Union. Vol. ii. 

 No. 1. Pretoria, June 1906.] 



We have already spoken of the founding of this new 

 ornithological journal and of the successful issue of the first 

 two numbers*. Number 1 of vol. ii., Avhich is now before 

 us, contains an account of the second annual meeting of the 

 Union, held at Johannesburg on August 30th, 1905, and 

 several well-written papers on South African Ornithology. 

 Mr. Bucknill describes some new South African eggs, 

 and illustrates them in a clear and well-coloured plate. 



* See < The Ibis,' 190o, p. 635, and 1906, p. 372. 



