340 Has the object of the


HAS THE OBJECT OF THE AVICULTURAL

MAGAZINE BEEN MISINTERPRETED ?


The magazine began life 21 years ago— i.e. in 1894—as a

journal for aviculturists, naturally at all times a very limited com¬

munity,who might indulge in the study of “British and foreign birds

in freedom and captivity,” and to this study anyone possessing all the

volumes will see that the Society has kept. That it ever became a

purely scientific magazine is quite untrue, although some people

directly they saw a Latin name which they were unable to interpret,

were at once inclined to say, “ Oh this is beyond us, this is scien¬

tific.” We certainly make use of titles of Latin and Greek derivation,

but the Avicultural Society has never published a magazine the

contents of which could not be understood and appreciated by any

of its members, even though they may not have enjoyed the privi¬

leges of a public school and university education ; the magazine has

always and invariably kept to an instructive and plain treatise on

British and foreign birds in freedom and captivity.


I say this, because it has undoubtedly been bruited about

that the magazine is for scientific ornithologists rather than for every

day homely and simple aviculturists, and what Mr. Fillmer wrote

in “ Bird Notes ” [started I think some seven years after the

“ Avicultural Magazine,” i.e. in 1901] was really misleading (c/.

B.N., Nov. 1901) in so far as he said that our society at that time

claimed to be a scientific society. We leave the science of orni¬

thology to more learned journals, notably the “ Ibis,” neither should

ice like to trespass on their ground. Mr. Fillmer wrote: “As a

“ large proportion of the members of the Foreign Bird Club are also

“ members of the Avicultural Society, I should like to try to make

“ plain the attitude of the Club towards the Society. Some of our

“ members have expressed a fear that the Club will injure the

“ Society. I do not think it will, FOR THE REASON THAT ITS AIMS

“ AND OBJECTS ARE DIFFERENT. The Avicultural Society, what-

“ ever it may once have been, now claims to be a scientific society.

[N.B. If any individual member did so, the Society itself never did !

H.D.A.] “ The Foreign Bird Club does not pretend to be in any


“ sense a scientific society, and aims at nothing more than the mutual



