﻿206 ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF BIRDS. 



minck's Monographs of the Gallinaceous Birds are clear 

 and masterly, and should be taken as a pattern for all 

 such dissertations. The description of the species, while 

 they are free from the turgidity above alluded to, are 

 scientific and accurate, while, in the Synopsis, each is 

 technically characterised by a short specific diagnosis in 

 Latin. The splendid folio volume, wherein all the spe- 

 cies are figured, rather belongs to our iconographic divi- 

 sion of ornithological works. A masterly Monograph of 

 the Parrots, by the late M. Kuhl, will be found essen- 

 tially necessary to every ornithologist who studies that 

 beautiful, but very intricate family, since it not only 

 contains many species not before characterised, but it 

 serves as a systematic index to the two splendid volumes 

 by Le Vaillant, subsequently noticed, upon the same 

 group. The Dendrocolapti, or tree-creepers of tropical 

 America, have been ably illustrated in a distinct essay by 

 the celebrated traveller and zoologist, Lichtenstein ; and 

 there is a monograph of the genus Lams, by Mr. Mac- 

 gillivrey, in the Wernerian Transactions. It would, 

 however, be utterly impossible, in a work of this nature, 

 to enumerate all the distinct essays and papers upon 

 ornithology, scattered through the voluminous transac- 

 tions and scientific records of all the learned societies in 

 Europe and America, since half our volume might be 

 filled with their titles. In the splendid folio plates of 

 the zoological subjects discovered on the three scientific 

 expeditions sent out by the French Government in the 

 L'Uraine, the Coquille, and the Astrolobe, are many new 

 and highly curious birds, particularly in the second of these 

 volumes, which records the acquisitions of M.M. Garnot 

 and Lesson : these latter descriptions, fortunately for the 

 generality of ornithologists, are rendered accesible to all 

 by being incorporated in the Manuel of the last men- 

 tioned naturalist. We may, perhaps, be permitted, in 

 this place, to mention that, in the six volumes which 

 compose our two series of Zoological Illustrations, there 

 are 115 plates and descriptions of birds, nearly all of which 

 are figured for the first time, and arranged under their 



