152 THE ORNITHOLOGICAL GUIDE. 



" Having for many years been collecting information 

 respecting the Swallow-tribes, which may perhaps 

 sometime be given to the public, on this occasion I 

 shall only observe, that the impression on my mind 

 is, they lie torpid during the brumal season. The 

 reasons on which this opinion is founded, would 

 lead me too far to explain in a work of this nature." 

 Yet this can hardly be wondered at in Mayor, 

 when the immortal George Cuvier expressed the 

 same opinion. Wilson has treated the absurdity 

 with no sparing hand, (see Art. Barn Swallow.) 

 The present volume contains some miserable cuts : 

 the work is useless and worse than useless. 



The Feathered Tribes of the British Islands : By Robert Mudie, 

 2 vols. 8vo £1. Is. 1834. Whiitakek and Co. 



This is, without any exception, the most truly 

 charming work on Ornithology which has hitherto 

 appeared from the days of Willughby^ downwards. 

 Other authors describe, Mudie paints, other authors 

 give the husk, Mudie, the kernel. We most keartiby 

 concur with the opinion expressed of this work by 

 Leigh Hunt (a kindred spirit) in the first few 

 numbers of his right pleasant London Journal. 

 The descriptions of Bewick, Pennant, Lewin, and 

 even of Montagu, will not for an instant stand com- 

 parison with the spirit-stirring emanations of Mudie's 

 " living pen" as it has well been called. 



