116 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



The Vertebrate Animals of Leicestershire and Rutland. By 

 Montagu Browne, F.Z.S. 4to, pp. 223. With four 

 plates and a map. Birmingham and Leicester : Midland 

 Educational Company, Limited, 1889. 



Ever since Mr. Browne's notes on the Vertebrate Animals of 

 Leicestershire appeared in ' The Zoologist ' for 1885-6-7, it has 

 been no secret that he proposed to reprint them with additions, and 

 to incorporate notes, by the Earl of Gainsborough and Mr. Horn, 

 of Uppingham, on the fauna of the adjoining county of Kutland. 

 This he has at length done, and the handsome volume now 

 before us is the result. 



As a matter of convenience, an octavo volume (to range with 

 the numerous county bird-books already published) would have 

 been preferable to a quarto, which has no apparent advantages 

 to recommend it. It would have been just as easy to figure 

 Natterer's Bat, and the three birds which have been selected, on 

 octavo plates, while a map on a larger scale than that given, 

 folded to octavo size would have been more useful. Indeed, so 

 far as their utility is concerned, the three plates of birds might 

 have been altogether omitted ; for while the Black Bedstart is 

 too well known and has been too often and too well figured to be 

 again represented, the plates of the Sand Grouse and Cream- 

 coloured Courser, being merely copies from Dresser's ' Birds of 

 Europe,' have no particular connection with Leicestershire. It 

 would have been more to the purpose to have figured, if still 

 preserved, the actual specimen of the Cream-coloured Courser 

 which was procured in the county in Oct. 1827, and passed into 

 the possession of Mr! Gisborne, of Yoxall, or even to have 

 copied Selby's, or Bewick's figure of it. 



As regards the text, we regret to have to express our dis- 

 appointment ; not so much in regard to the subject matter, as to 

 the arrangement of it. We regard it as a mistake to have mixed 

 up, as the author has done, living and fossil species. The extinct 

 forms should have been kept distinct, and dealt with separately. 

 By this plan the reader would have been enabled to form a 

 clearer idea of the existing fauna of the area in question which 

 we take it is the object of such a book, instead of having his 

 attention perpetually distracted by the interposition of matter 

 altogether foreign to the purpose. 



