﻿196 ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF BIRDS. 



mented with five times the number of species contained 

 in in the Systema Natura. A misplaced veneration for 

 their great master, or personal inertness, induced his 

 disciples to go on appropriating all these new species to 

 the old genera, without venturing to construct others 

 for them, when they plainly and palpably would not 

 agree in a single essential character with any one of 

 the old genera. It was sufficient for a bird to have a 

 flat bill to constitute it a Muscicapa, and all slender- 

 billed birds became warblers (Sylvia). The conse- 

 quence has been that these groups, and numberless 

 others, became common receptacles for almost any thing, 

 and if a student, or even a practised ornithologist, at- 

 tempted to find out the name of a species, he must often 

 read over the descriptions of near 300, without, in all 

 probability, attaining his object. In the most recent 

 and voluminous work on general ornithology in our 

 language, there are 237 species of Falco, 177 of Musci- 

 capa, 298 of Sylvia, 121 of Loxia, and 150 of Frin- 

 gilla. One would have imagined that in such a genus 

 as Merops, — where the remarkably short, weak, and 

 syndactyle foot, is such a strong and obvious char- 

 acter, — no mistake could possibly arise. But even 

 here, so little were these authors accustomed to ad- 

 here to the definitions of their master, that we ac- 

 tually find a large number of strong-footed thrushes 

 (Brachypus) mixed up in their systems with the true 

 Linnaean bee-eaters, because, as it may be presumed, 

 the plumage of both is green ; while many of the 

 honeysuckers (Mdiphagidce) are placed with Merops, 

 notwithstanding their strong and very perfect feet. 

 The student, therefore, even if he follows Linnaeus, 

 can place no reliance whatever upon the systems which 

 actually profess to follow this master. These obstacles, 

 great as they are, would not altogether be insurmount- 

 able, if the descriptions of the species were sufficiently 

 full or accurate to lead to the determination of a bird, 

 even if it should be placed in a wrong genus. But 

 here our difficulty is increased two-fold : it has, until 



