The Zoologist— July, 1870. 2193 



A List of the Birds of Cornwall. By Edward He'arlf, Rood, Esq. 



[From its very commencement, Mr. Rodd has been the warm 

 friend and consistent supporter of the 'Zoologist': neither tlie allure- 

 ments of so-called popularity nor the blandishments of technicalities, 

 so irresistibly attractive to younger men, have induced him to swerve 

 one jot or tittle from the Journal that he knew was doing the work he 

 wanted to be done : though a host of competitors, year after year, have 

 offered him the charm of novelty, he has been faithful to his first love, 

 and has made the ' Zoologist' the fit repository of every observation in 

 Cornish Ornithology during more than a quarter of a centur}'. I believe 

 there is no similar instance to be found in the entire range of Natural- 

 History literature. Hence the Avifauna of Cornwall has been worked 

 out in a more thorough manner, and the record preserved in a more 

 available form, than that of any other English county ; and this is 

 saying much, for have we not the delightful works of Stevenson, 

 Harting, Cecil Smith and others, who have laboured more successfully 

 to make the little world of ornithologists familiar with the birds which 

 surround their homes ; nor must I omit the names of J. H. Gurney and 

 W. R. Fislier, whose papers on the Avifauna of Norfolk, published in 

 the earlier volumes of the ' Zoologist,' really leave nothing to be 

 desired. 



I have often said, and in thus applauding the labours of our inde- 

 fatigable workers I do not shrink from the position, that a county is 

 no natural division of the earth's surface ; and that a bird appearing 

 Trilbin its statutory limits is a fact of small value in physical geography : 

 such a bird is neither a native nor a denizen ; indeed its passing over, 

 or even its alighting, is a mere fortuitous circumstance, and has no 

 more connection with the soil than the fleecy clouds which float over 

 it on a summer's evening. Then again I regard as the least, not as 

 the most, interesting names in a county or local list, those excessive 

 rarities which seem, on account of the very abnormity of their 

 occurrence, to be most highly prized. My estimation of such abnormal 

 occurrences is in an inverse ratio to that of many a fellow-labourer in 

 the Science. I think little of a golden eagle at Box Hill, still less of 

 a griffon vulture in the Cove of Cork ; nothing at all of a darter [Plotus 

 Anhii}ga) at Poole; and I read with a kind of abhorrent shudder of a 

 kiwi kiwi killed in Wales : yet these dainties have been cooked for us 

 by competent artists, and truthful artists too ; and have been dished 



SECOND SERIES — VOL. V. 2 I 



