Meanwhile, Bryant's interest in the undertaking has not flagged, 

 and he has" embraced opportunities in connection with his new work 

 under the Fish and Game Commission, to secure information for use 

 in bur general chapters, as well as here and there throughout the 

 accounts of species. 



It is but just to state here that the whole game-bird book has 

 been brought to a conclusion only through the opportunities afforded 

 under the auspices of the University of California Museum of Verte- 

 brate Zoology; and the maintenance of this museum in all its func- 

 tions has been due to the continued financial support furnished in 

 generous measure by Miss Alexander. 



The arduous typing and retyping of the manuscript was a neces- 

 sary labor, done faithfully by Miss Margaret W. Wythe, of the 

 museum staff. Corrections in the phrasing were suggested by Mr. 

 Aubrey Boyd, instructor in English in the University of California. 

 Mr. Albert H. Allen, manager of the University Press, evinced personal 

 interest in the enterprise in many ways during the process of compila- 

 tion. The line drawings were done by Miss Frieda Lueddemann, 

 directly from museum specimens. Of the sixteen colored plates, nine 

 were done specially for this book by Louis Agassiz Fuertes; three 

 colored drawings, also by Fuertes, were loaned for our use by the 

 California Fish and Game Commission; and the use of four colored 

 drawings done by Allan Brooks was allowed by their owners, two 

 of them by Miss Annie M. Alexander, one by Mr. A. Bra'zier Howell, 

 and one through Mr. "W. Leon Dawson, the latter from the stock of 

 Brooks drawings owned by the Birds of California Publishing Com- 

 pany, and intended for use ultimately in Dawson's Birds of California. 



I would like to repeat here a principle in which I fully believe; 

 namely, that the highest plane of scientific output can be accomplished 

 only through cooperative effort. If the present contribution proves to 

 have reached an unusually satisfactory plane in any respect it will be 

 because the attention of several workers rather than of a single indi- 

 vidual has been devoted to it. "Where one author working alone would 

 make mistakes unawares, two or, better, three, are able to check one 

 another's output to advantage. The best results, always granting 

 mutually sympathetic interest, will follow organized cooperative toil. 



Joseph Grinnell 



Director of the California Museum 

 of Vertebrate Zoology. 

 Transmitted November 30, 1916. 



[iv] 



