278 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



subject, that, taking the facts as they are, it is not absolutely 

 proved that a group of animals having all the characters exhibited 

 by species in nature has ever arisen by selection either natural or 

 artificial. What is still wanting is direct evidence that selection 

 is capable of originating in species races which exhibit at the 

 time of interbreeding any sign of sterility. 



It is satisfactory to find that the author sees no reason to 

 complain of his views being misrepresented by his translator, 

 M. Henri de Varigny, but that, on the contrary, the latter 

 has exhibited much skill in the French reproduction of these 

 essays. 



L' Amateur cVOiseaux de Voliere : Espcces indigenes et exotiques. 

 Par Henri Moreau. Sm. 8vo, pp. 430; avec 51 figures. 

 Paris : Bailliere et Fils. 



Since 1795, when Bechstein published his German work on 

 cage-birds, which has been translated into French, English, and 

 other languages, a great number of books on this subject have 

 appeared, though very few have approached it in merit. 



Vieillot, in his ' Histoire des Oiseaux Chanteurs' (1805), was 

 somewhat in advance of his time in regard to the instructions 

 which he gave for the treatment in captivity of the exotic 

 Passeres, particularly the Finches; and 'Die Auslandischen 

 Sing- vogel' of Reichenbach, with its coloured plates and the 

 Latin, German, French, and English names, is a useful book of 

 reference so far as it goes. The date of its publication, although 

 the volume lies before us, we have not been able to ascertain. 

 There is no date on the title-page, and none of the catalogues to 

 which we have referred give the desired information. 



The Germans, as everyone knows, are great lovers of cage- 

 birds, and the best books on the subject have emanated from 

 German authors. Besides the works of Bechstein and Reichen- 

 bach, already mentioned, there is Brehm's ' Gefangene Vogel,' in 

 two vols., 1871-76 ; the work of the brothers Adolf and Karl 

 Muller, ' Gefangenleben der besten einheimischen Singvogel' 

 (1871), and the ' Handbuch fur Vogelliebhaber' (1873), and 'Die 

 Fremdlandischen Vogel, ihre naturgeschichte Pflege und Zucht' 

 (1877), by Dr. Karl Russ. 



The Italians, from the time of Olina, whose 'Uccelleria' was 

 printed in 1622, seem to have been bird-catchers rather than bird- 



