NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 461 



only information given (p. 113) is that "a very few specimens 

 have been obtained in different parts of the country " ; of four 

 species of Shrike (p. 116), one of which, Lanius excubitor, as 

 might have been stated, is a regular winter visitor ; of the 

 Ortolan and Lapland Buntings, each of which is dismissed in 

 three lines; of the Shore Lark, which is accorded two lines; and 

 so forth. Such treatment we regard as quite inadequate, and the 

 same may be said of what Mr. Hudson has to tell us concerning 

 many other well-known species. It is evident that with many of 

 the birds described, Mr. Hudson has had little or no opportunity 

 of making himself personally acquainted. He has therefore had 

 to rely upon secondhand information, which in many cases is not 

 up to date : witness, for example, the meagre account of the 

 nesting in Scotland of the Snow Bunting; of the Chough, whose 

 breeding-haunts in Scotland and Ireland are ignored (p. 158) ; 

 of the Grey Plover (p. 286), the Little Stint (p. 302), the Knot 

 (p. 305), and many others. On the whole we are disappointed 

 with the letterpress, which is in many respects below the standard 

 of excellence required at the present day. It is perhaps hardly 

 to be expected that a writer on the subject of British birds 

 should be personally acquainted with every species on which he 

 writes, but in the case of those with which he is not familiar there 

 is abundant trustworthy information to be found, if the author 

 knows where to look for it. A. want of sufficient acquaintance 

 with the literature of the subject is apparent throughout the 

 volume. With so many county bird-books at hand for reference, 

 there is no excuse for writing of the Black Grouse (for example) 

 as extinct in the south of England, " except in the New Forest, 

 where a few birds survive." This misapprehension would have 

 been at once dispelled had the author consulted the excellent and 

 reliable works of Borrer, Mansel Pleydell A. C. Smith, Cecil 

 Smith, D'Urban, and Murray Mathew, in which he might have 

 found sufficient evidence of the existence of this fine game-bird 

 in Surrey, Sussex, Hants, Dorset, Wilts, Somerset, and Devon, 

 to say nothing of its haunts in Herefordshire, and South Wales, 

 as vouched for by other observers. 



But although Mr. Hudson's book may not come up to the 

 standard expected by professed ornithologists, it will perhaps 

 satisfy the requirements of ordinary readers, and the information 

 given will be acceptable enough so far as it goes ; while the 



