168 Mr. Yarrell's Reply on the Discovery of Cygnus Bewickii. 



mon wild swan the junction of the wind-pipe with the bron j 

 chial pipes takes place just underneath the bend of the merry- 

 thought ; but in the new one, exactly under the hind bend of 

 the wind-pipe; and finally, in the new kind the bronchial 

 tubes are much shorter. I am afraid I have only given a 

 very bungling description, but I hope, such as it is, it may be 

 acceptable. I quite regret I cannot draw sufficiently well to 

 send you a sketch of the two." 



Such is the description ; and having stated it, I leave it to 

 the opinion of any person conversant with the subject, whether 

 I should have been warranted in deciding that the differences 

 were such as would constitute a new species. How few are 

 there even now, with the figures of both species before them, 

 who would be able to recognise either from such a descrip- 

 tion ! And was I not justified in supposing there might have 

 been "error of observation" ? To say nothing of the confu- 

 sion which renders much of this description unintelligible, it 

 is quite clear from what we now know, that in more than one 

 part of it, for ' old species ' we must read ' new species ', and 

 vice versa. 



The new light stated by your anonymous correspondent to 

 have afterwards dawned upon me, he ought also injustice to 

 have added, was in the month of November 1829, and was 

 the legitimate consequence of the acquisition of new materials. 

 And surely I cannot with fairness be accused of any endeavour 

 to depreciate the merits of Mr. Wingate, whom I have never 

 spoken to or even seen, when in December last I offered to 

 him, thus wholly unknown to me except by name, the mate- 

 rials I possessed, to complete his paper ; nor that I exhibited 

 any intention of keeping him out of sight, when, after he had 

 declined publishing, I included in my statement a notice of his 

 discovery of the same bird, with a date ten months antecedent 

 to my own paper. 



I have reason to believe, from several circumstances, that 

 there was a scarcity of materials at Newcastle, and that they 

 were insufficient for framing a description of this bird, as re- 

 garded the internal construction. 



At the end of December I received a letter from Mr. Selby, 

 requesting to be allowed to mate use of some observations in 

 a letter of mine on the subject of this bird, with any further 

 remarks, and the use of any drawings I possessed relating to 

 this species, which, to use that gentleman's own words, he 

 writes, "you so appropriately suggest should be named after 

 our celebrated countryman the late Mr. Bewick." The ma- 

 terials offered Mr. Wingate I transferred to Mr. Selby, with 

 all the additions, which, during the interval, had come to my 



knowledge, 



