b x^ii 



PREFACE. 



HAVE prepared, at Mr. QuaritcVs request, an Index 

 for the eleventh volume of " Stray Feathers/' as 

 I believe that all Ornithologists have long felt 

 the necessity of such a table of reference for this 

 important work — one of the most valuable of 

 Mr. Hume's many contributions to Ornithological Science. 



It is much to be regretted that Mr. Hume, in the midst of 

 more pressing avocations, has never found time to complete 

 his promised introduction to the present volume, which was to 

 have contained a comparison of the Avifaunse of Sind and 

 Manipur {vide p. v). All those who have read the account of 

 his Sind Expedition (Yol. I, pp. 91-289) or that of his visit to 

 the Andamans and JN^icobars (Yol. II, pp. 29-324), will agree 

 with me that the want of a similar essay in the present volume 

 is never sufficiently to be regretted. 



CHARLES CHUBB. 



Zoological Department, 



British Museum (Natural History). 

 January 1st, 1899. 



