ea Recent Literature. 239 
using words which may seem to be extravagantly laudatory. Perhaps we 
may say simply, by way of conveying our appreciation of its real merit, 
that only one ornithologist who has ever lived, or who is now living, 
could have written it. In purport and scope, it is a critical review of 
ornithology, from the start to such degree of finish as the science has 
acquired today; in substance, it is a summary bibliography of those works 
upon which the foundations of the science rest most securely, and of those 
which have most contributed to its permanent superstructure — ‘ each after 
its kind’ being set forth in chronological order, in proper historical per- 
spective, with due regard for symmetrical proportion; in form, by which 
we mean its literary style, it is a model to be admired by all but success- 
»fully imitated by none. Professor Newton’s ripe scholarship has perhaps 
never been more adequately shown than on this occasion, when only a 
master of the art of exposition, who combined in himself the qualities 
of a great ornithologist and a great bibliographer, could have brought his 
forces to bear upon the business in hand with the requisite lucidity and 
precision. The literature of ornithology is so huge — indeed, Professor 
Newton speaks of the science as in danger of being smothered there- 
under — that one might well be dismayed in face of any undertaking to set 
it forth intelligibly, with hardly more than a hundred pages at command 
in which to accentuate its strong points and stigmatize its weak or 
futile ones, with even-handed justice throughout —so almost incessant, 
in this case, must have been the temptation to mercy. For performances 
whose chief or only merit may be found in those good intentions with 
which a certain mythical locality is said to be paved, Professor Newton’s 
good-nature is unfailing, as his patience is unwearied. But for the 
sciolists and shams of whatever low degree, for the posers and plagiarists 
of whatever high pretentions, for any writers whose good faith may be 
questioned or whose good opinion of themselves is vanity — ve victis ! 
The schoolmaster is abroad, and his ferule is felt to be a stinging one. 
For pith and pungency Professor Newton’s criticisms compare not 
unfavorably with Huxley’s. They are equally pointed and polished ; 
they are passed with equal courtesy and dignity; they are generally 
tempered with some saving clause, whether to be passed to the credit of 
the critic’s charity or of his ingenuity we cannot always say; but he 
seldom presents the chastening rod in one hand without holding out a 
box of ointment in the other. It reminds us of Kamadeva, the Hindu 
Eros — him of the bee-strung bow, whose keenest shafts were tipped with 
roses. 
In so phrasing his parable the present reviewer feels sure he voices no 
sentiments unshared by others of his own craft. Referring to the article 
‘Ornithology’ in the Ninth Edition of the ‘Encyclopedia Britannica’ -— 
it is well known that the present ‘ Dictionary’ is founded upon the series 
of articles contributed by Professor Newton to that publication, modified 
into something like continuity, and further built up by the intercalation 
of a much greater number, to serve the same end 
a distinguished leader 
