II. 
ORNITHOLOGY. 
By R. BowDLER Sharpe, F.L.S., F.Z.S., Etc. 
Senior Assistant, Zoological Department, British Museum. 
(Plates A, B.) 
The Collection of Birds made by the late Mr. Frank Oates 
was formed by that gentleman with the greatest care, and 
it is seldom that it falls to the lot of the naturalist to 
examine a series of birds in which the particulars of 
capture are so carefully noted on each specimen as in the 
present instance. For this reason alone, therefore, the 
collection is of great importance ; but, besides this, it re- 
presents without ,doubt a very fair idea of the avifauna of 
the parts of the Transvaal and Matabele countries through 
which Mr. Oates travelled. Of the birds of the former 
province Mr. Ayres has published several accounts in 
recent volumes of the " Ibis," and in the same journal for 
1874, Mr. T. E. Buckley gave a list of the birds met with 
by him on his journey through the Matabele country, where 
he travelled for some part of the time with Mr, Oates : 
but as Mr. Buckley did not get beyond Tati, it has been 
left for Mr. Oates to give us the first account of the birds 
which are to be met with between that place and the 
Zambesi. His untimely death was a great loss to science, 
for, after his long journey to that river, he had at last 
reached a terra fere incog7ilta to the ornithologist, where 
there is little doubt that further researches would have 
crowned his efforts with the discovery of many new and 
important facts. The avifauna of the Zambesi region is 
