214 Letters, Notes and Extracts. 
25. Warren on the Birds in the Natal Museum. 
[First Report of the Natal Government Museum. Year ending 
Slst December, 1904. Pietermaritzburg, 1906. ] 
The new Director, Dr. Ernest Warren, is able to give a 
good account of the progress of the Natal Government 
Museum since its removal into its present quarters in 1894. 
He devotes the first portion of his Report to a description of 
the various rooms and of the collections which they contain, 
and gives many illustrations of the different departments. 
The second portion of the Report contains catalogues of 
some of the collections, amongst which is one of the “ Birds, 
Birds’-nests, and Eggs.” The mounted specimens of Birds 
are arranged in one series, according to Dr. Bowdler Sharpe’s 
classification, and consist principally of South-African and 
British specimens. It is, no doubt, necessary to have a 
more or less complete General Collection, but the Natal 
Museum should, in our opinion, also have a special series of 
the native birds of the Colony either mounted or in skins, 
and this we hope will be provided in due course. 
Dr. Warren has also started a new Journal (‘Annals of the 
Natal Government Museum’), of which we have seen the first 
number (vol. i. part i.). ‘It will deal almost entirely with 
South-African matters—Geological, Zoological, Botanical, 
and Ethnological.” 
VIII.—Letters, Notes and Extracts. 
We have received the following letters addressed “To the 
Editors of ‘The Ibis’ ” :— 
Sirs,—As you ask me for any personal evidence that I 
can give as to the habits of the Houey-guide, I send you the 
following particulars :— 
In September 1905 I made the journey from Umtali to 
Melsetter, walking along the beaten track, accompanied by 
seven or eight natives. At one place I sawasmall bird about 
the size of a Lark apparently following my party, and occa- 
sionally perching on the trees near the road. I asked one of 
