The Wilson Bulletin. 26 



THE WILSON BULLETIN. 



A Quarterly Magazine Devoted to the Study of Living Birds. 

 Official Organ of the Wilson Ornithological Chapter of the Agassiz 

 Association. 



Edited by LYNDS JONES. 



Published by the Chapter at Oberlin, Ohio. 



/ 



SUBSCRIPTION RATES. 

 Price in the United States, Canada and Mexico, Fifty Cents a year, Fifteen Cents a num- 

 ber, postage paid. 

 Price in all countries in the International Postal Union, Sixty-Five Cents a year, Twenty 

 Cents a number. 

 Subscriptions may be sent to Lynds Jones, Oberlin, Ohio, or to Mr. Frank L. Burns, Ber- 

 wyn, Penn., or to Mr. John W. Daniel, Jr., 3146 Q street, N.W., Washington, D. C. 



EDITORIAL. 



A decade has passed since the organization of the correspond- 

 ing Wilson Ornithological Chapter of the Agassiz Association 

 on a basis of co-operative study of the life histories of our birds. 

 The results attained have proved that the scheme of co-operative 

 study is practicable and profitable, and the publication of the re- 

 sults have proved an incentive to many outside the Chapter to 

 enter the field for active service. We have reason to be proud of 

 our record. 



From the first we have stood boldly for the study of life histo- 

 ries as a legitimate part of scientific ornithology as opposed to 

 the purely popular. Because we have chosen, usually, to use the 

 vernacular rather than the scientific names of the birds, and have 

 aspired to some degree of literary form in expression, it does 

 not therefore follow that we have been unscientific in method. 

 The results have proved the contrary. Technical language has 

 its legitimate place, but w r e hold that it is not an essential to sci- 

 entific results. We must not be understood as opposed to syste- 

 matic and structural ornithology. On the contrary, we are hearti- 

 ly in sympathy with the effort to fashion a stable system of clas- 

 sification. But that is not our field. Systematic ornithology must 



