240 BRITISH BIRDS. [vol. vn 



The Peregrine Falcon at the Eyrie. By Francis Heatherley, 

 F.R.C.S. " Country Life " Library, pp. 78, Demy 4to. 

 5s. net. 



Our Common Sea-Birds. By Percy R. Lowe, B.A., M.B., 

 etc. "Country Life " Library, pp. 310, 4to. 15s. net. 



These two volumes of the " Country Life " Library are 

 chiefly notable for the beauty of their photographic illus- 

 trations, which are admirably printed, with the text, on 

 glossy " art " paper. In some ways this is an objectionable 

 arrangement, as the print on the highly-glazed paper is 

 trying to read, and one cannot turn over a page devoted 

 to an illustration which intervenes, perhaps in the middle 

 of a sentence, without admiring the photograph, and thus 

 losing the thread of the narrative. 



Dr. Heatherley's book is the more important to the serious 

 student. It is based on notes made during three successive 

 springs at the same eyrie, and while there is much informa- 

 tion which will be of interest to photographers, we are also 

 given a very complete account of the methods and times 

 of feeding the young and the nature of the food, and much 

 concerning the temperaments of the parent-birds. The 

 style of the narrative is somewhat monotonous if at times 

 highly colloquial, while the head-lines to the pages are so 

 absurdly phrased as to be much more fitting to a book of 

 nursery rhymes than one of Natural History. The author 

 writes of the two smaller birds of the four young as 

 "males"; but of this he appears to have no proof, and it 

 seems more likely that these two were the last hatched 

 than that they should show so marked a sexual difference 

 in size when only a few days old. The most interesting 

 point brought out in the text is, perhaps, that the male 

 Falcon attended chiefly to the young, while the female did 

 most of the hunting and brought the quarry to the tiercel, 

 but it would be unwise to give this observation general 

 application owing to the fact that there was a " hiding- 

 shed " quite near the eyrie and that the female was very 

 shy while the male was very bold. Dr. Heatherley makes 

 some exaggerated remarks about the " official ornithologist," 

 under which term apparently he includes all those who are 

 not content to study merely the living bird. Anyone who 

 collects either birds or eggs is to him anathema, while 

 subspecies-making is one of the " saddest features of 

 modern ornithology." In fine, our author would have us all 

 study birds in his own way and no other. Yet he cannot 

 say from his own knowledge whether the male or female 



