308 REVIEWS AND BOOK NOTICES. 
but the quotation is incorrect, and conveys a very different mean- 
ing from the original. A signature to this circular can have no 
weight in the present discussion, as the document is so worded 
that it calls for no definite information whatever in regard to the 
real date of publication of any one of the doubtful papers. In 
this respect, and in its inaccuracy, the circular resembles perfectly 
Prof. Cope’s other publications which I have recently criticised. 
REVIEWS AND BOOK NOTICES. 
A TEXT-BOOK or Norra American OrnirnoLoey. — Suitable 
manuals of zoology, treating of single classes of animals, have 
hitherto been desiderata in our zoological literature. The subject 
of the present brief notice — Dr. Elliott Coues’ “Key to North 
American Birds”* — is a work unique in its conception, and the 
first of a kind one may well hope to see soon supplied for each 
class of our native animals, and especially for the several classes 
of the vertebrates. In these classes the number of species is small 
in comparison with the number of species of insects and of plants, 
and can be readily comprised in a volume of convenient size for a 
hand-book. Gray’s admirable series of botanical text-books fur- 
nish guides to our flora that render accessible to the ordinary stu- 
dent and amateur a general knowledge of our plants, but until now 
we have had no similar handbook for any department of zoology- 
The character of Dr. Coues’ work, so far as fidelity of treatment 
and scientific accuracy are concerned, is sufficiently endorsed by 
the high character of his various special memoirs and monographs, 
and his high standing as an original investigator. The value of 
his “Key” as a text-book of American ornithology may be re- 
garded as two-fold ; first, its clear exposition of the latest and most 
generally approved views of the subject treated, and, secondly, its 
scope and the arrangement of the subject matter itself. A general 
“Introduction ” treats of the leading principles of ornithology, and 
describes in detail, aided by suitable illustrations, the external 
*Key to North American Birds, containing a concise account of every species of 
Living and Fossil Bird at present known from the Continent north of the Mexican 
United States Boundary. es 6 Steel Plates and upwards of 250 Woodcuts- 
By Elliott Coues, Assist. Surg. U.S. Army. Salem: Naturalists’ Agency; New York 
‘ & Mead; Boston Tack & Lacan, hte 
