1889. ] Recent Litevature. I 69 
sidered some twenty or thirty additional cases of similar character, in which 
the proposed changes were found untenable, orin which the material ex- 
amined was not sufficient to determine the question of their validity; and 
its decision thereon may be thus considered as in the main negatively 
recorded in the following pages. All questions of this nature known to 
the Committee at the time of its meeting [in November, 1888] were acted 
upon.” The matter is classified under three heads: I, Additions; II, 
Eliminations; III, Changes of Nomenclature. 
The additions number 23 species and 43 subspecies, one genusand three 
subgenera. The eliminations are two species and one subspecies. The 
changes in nomenclature are three affecting genera, two affecting subgen- 
era, fifteen affecting species, and twoaffecting subspecies. 
The Committee to whom the work was assigned by the Union consists 
of Messrs. Allen, Brewster, Coues, Merriam and Ridgway. Mr. Ridg- 
way acted as the Committee’s secretary, to whom also fell the greater part 
of the work of preparing the manuscript for printing. 
The interval covered by the Supplement is scarcely threeyears. As the 
foregoing statistics show, they have been years of remarkable activity in 
North American ornithology, during which exploration has been pushed 
with unprecedented vigor, yielding results far beyond the most san- 
guine expectations.—J. A. A. 
The Abridged A. O. U. Check-List.*—Simultaneously with the publica- 
tion of the ‘Supplement,’ the Union issues an Abridged Check-List of 
North American Birds, containing not only the species and subspecies of 
the old Check-List, but also the additions and the changes of nomenclature 
made in the Supplement, the additions being interpolated in their proper 
places. The Abridged Check-List ‘‘contains only the scientific names, 
English names, concordance and current numbers.” The list of Fossil 
Birds contained in the original Check-List, however, has been omitted, and 
a list of introduced or ‘Naturalized Species’ has been added. This edition of 
the Check-List is thus not only abridged, but revised to date. It is printed 
on only one side of the paper, thus adapting it for use in labelling, or for the 
reception of notes or additions. The preparation of the manuscript for 
this edition was made by Dr. Merriam, at the request of the Committee; 
he also supervised the printing, and compiled the list of ‘Naturalized Spe- 
cies,’to whom this latter task was especially assigned by the Committee. 
Collation of the abridged edition with the original Check-List and Sup- 
plement shows an almost faultless correspondence, the only discrepancies 
of any importance being in the numeration, where 420 c in the abridged 
edition should be 420 6, and 519c¢ should be 519 6. The ‘Hypothetical 
List, however, has been renumbered, there having been here one elimina- 
’ tion and two additions.—J. A. A. 
*Check-List | of | North American Birds | According to the Canons of Nomencla- 
ture | of the | American Ornithologists’ Union | — | Abridged Edition | Revised | — | 
Published by the American Ornithologists’ Union | 1889.—8vo, pp. 71. 
