Vol. xxxvi.] 12 



should be Systematically studied. Of course we need the 

 observatious on the courtship^ the breeding-habits, and the 

 whole life-iiistory as well ; but we cannot dispense with the 

 ground-work any more than we can work out the ornithology 

 of a district without specimens of tbe birds themselves. 

 This may be a truism, but the liufortunate fact remains that 

 the workers in one branch of ornithology hamper and hinder, 

 instead of helping, those who are engaged in that section on 

 which I am speaking to-night. 



At a previous debate at the B. O. C. the somewhat weari- 

 some iteration of agreement or disagreement with the 

 previous speaker was broken by a short speech by Mr. Ire- 

 dale, which, unfortunately, was only very briefly reported in 

 the officii! summary. We were discussing the question of 

 what constitutes a generic character, and Mr. Iredale said 

 that in the ideal scheme of classification one must not be 

 content witVi anatomical distinctions, but that every stage in 

 the bird's development — the egg, the embryo, the down.- 

 stage, the pterylography — should receive its share of 

 consideration. Seebohm, in vol. v. of the Brit, Mus, 

 ' Catalogue of Birds, ^ boldly accepted the spotted plumage 

 of the immature Turdidse as the main character by which he 

 differentiated them from the other subfamily of Sylviinse ; 

 and it is becoming more and more clear that in the future 

 we shall not be content to depend solely on structural 

 characters. 



I have never urged that oological characters should be the 

 dominant factor in determining the position of a bird in the 

 genealogical tree of life. To do so would, in my opinion, 

 be just as absurd as to attempt the complete classification of 

 birds by one structural character. There is a natural 

 tendency to exaggerate the importance of what one has 

 made a special study oP, as Garrod over-estimated the 

 importance of the ambiens muscle, and others have laid 

 undue stress on other characters, such as the intestinal 

 convolutions or the deep plantar tendons. Even the 

 maxillo-palatal bones, whose characters were so ably eluci- 

 dated by Huxley, form only a part (although an important 

 pne) of the enormous mass of material fi ora w hich the final 



