May 29, 1884.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



343 



bis metallic tn-r! iu-e! u-u. r lu-r! as be proclaims to bis male 

 that "all is well." When tbe little family arrives the joyous 

 parents are busy from early r, orning until night foraging 

 for food , and they are valuable at this season as most inde- 

 fatigable inseet destroyers. As I have said, the oriole is 

 strictly a tree bird, and rarely seen below. He has often 

 come to the bath, however, yielding to its attractions during 

 tbe summer heats, and a beautiful sight it is to sec him dash 

 the spray from his jetty wiijft's as he washes, his handsome 

 brown eyes rivaling the riving drops in then 1 sparkles. 

 When does be arrive'' With the buds and blossoms; when 

 the orchards are covered with flaky blooms, and the locust 

 tills the air with its perfume, then 'it is you hear him, with 

 his wild voice full of the breezy tree tops and his bright: form 

 gleaming like a coal of fire among tbe leaves. Ta-ef tv-ef 

 te-uf m-4! Wilmot. 



NEW York City. 



THE COUESIAN PERIOD. 



By R. W. Shnfeldt, Cap*, Medical Corps, U. S. A., Chairman Section 

 of Avian Anatomy, A. O. U. Continuation of the Histor- 

 ical Preface from advance sheets of Cone's "Key."! 



The Post-Linn.ean Epoch: 1758-1800. 

 (1758—17661) 



THE U'Mwmn period.— An interregnum here, during 

 which not a notable work or worker appears in North 

 American ornithology itself. But events elsewhere occurred, 

 the reflex action of which upon our theme is simply incalcu- 

 lable, fully requiring the recognition of this period. The 

 dates, 1758-1766, are respectively those of the appearance of 

 ihe tenth and of the twelfth edition of the "Systema Natura?" 

 of Liuna?us. In the former tbe illustrious Swede first form- 

 ally and consistently applied his system of nomenclature to 

 all birds known to him; the latter is his completed system, 

 as it finally left his hands; and from then to now, zoologists, 

 find especially ornithologists, have disputed whether 1758 or 

 1766 should be taken as tbe starting point of zoological nom- 

 enclature. In ornithology, the matter is still at issue be- 

 tween the American and British schools. However this may 

 result, the fact remains that during this "Linnsean period," 

 1758 to 1766, we have the origin of till the tenable specific 

 names of those of our birds which were known to Linnaeus; 

 the gathering up and methodical digestion and systematic 

 arrangement of all that had gone before. Let this scant de- 

 cade stand — mute in America, but eloqueut in Sweden, and 

 since applauded to the echo of the world. 



Nor is this all. The year 1760 saw the famous "Ornitho- 

 logia" of Mathurin Jacques Brissou (* April 20, 1725— f June 

 33, 1806) in six portly quartos with 261 folded plates, and 

 elaborate descriptions in Latiu and French, of hundreds of 

 birds, a fair proportion of which are North American. Many 

 are described for the first time, though unfortunately not in 

 the binomial nomenclature. The work holds permanent 

 place, and most of the original descriptions of Brissou are 

 among the surest bases of Linna>an species. 



(1 766-1 785 ) 



The Forsterian Period! — Nearly twenty Years have now 

 elapsed with so little incident that two brochures determine 

 the complexion of this period. John Reinhold Forster was 

 a learned and able man, whose connection with North 

 American ornithology is interesting, In 1771 he published 

 a tract, now very scarce and of no consequence whatever, 

 entitled "A Catalogue of the Animals of North America." 

 But it was the first attempt to do anything of tbe sort — in 

 short, the first thing of its kind. It gives 302 birds, neither 

 described nor even named scientifically. But that was a 

 large number of North American birds to even mention in 

 those days — more than Wilson gave in 1814, Forster fol- 

 lowed np this exploit in 1772 with an interesting and valu- 

 able account of fifty-eight birds from Hudson's Bay, occupy- 

 ing some fifty pages of the "Philosophical Transactions." 

 Several of these birds were new to science, and were formally 

 named; such as our white-throated sparrow, black-poll warb- 

 ler, Hudsonian titmouse and Eskimo curlew. Aside from its 

 intrinsic merit, this paper is notable as the first formal treatise 

 exclusively devoted to a collection of North American birds 

 sent abroad. The period is otherwise marked by the publi- 

 cation in 1780 of Fabricius's "Fauna Gramlandica, " in which 

 some fifty birds of Greenland receive attention ; and especially 

 by the appearance of a great statesman and one of the Presi- 

 dents of tbe United States in the r61e of ornithologist; 

 Thomas Jefferson's "Notes on tbe State of Virginia" having 

 been first privately printed in Paris in 1782, though the 

 authorized publication was not till 1787. It contains a list 

 of seventy-seven birds cf Virginia, fortified with references 

 to Catesby, Linnaeus and Brisson as the author's authorities. 

 There were many editions, one dating 1853. 



The long publication in France of one of the monumental 

 works on general ornithology coincides very nearly with this 

 period. 1 refer of course to Buffon and his collaborators. 

 The "Histoire Nature] le des Oiseaux," by Buffon and Mont- 

 beillard, dates in its original edition 1770-1783, being in nine 

 quarto volumes, with 264 plain plates. It forms a part of the 

 grand set of volumes dating 1749-1804, in their original edi- 

 tions. With the nine bird volumes are associated the mag- 

 nificent series of colored plates known as the "Planches 

 Enlu mines," published in 42 fascicles, from 1755 to 1781. 

 The plates are 1,008 in number, of which 973 represent 

 birds. 



(1785-1791.) 



The PeiLiiuiilian PwmL. — A great landmark — one of the 

 most conspicuous of the last century— was set up with the 

 appearance in 1785 of the second volume of Thomas Pen- 

 nan'fs "Arctic Zoology." The whole work, in three quarto 

 volumes with many plates, 1784-87, was "designed as a 

 sketch of the zoology of North America." In this year, 

 also, John Latham "completed the third volume (or sixth 

 part) of his "General Synopsis of Birds." These two great 

 works have much in common, in so for as a more restricted 

 treatise can be compared with a more comprehensive one; 

 and in the history of our subject the names of Latham aud 

 Pennant are linked as closely as those of Catesby and Ed- 

 wards. The parallel maybe drawn still further; for neither 

 Pennant nor Latham (up to the date in mention) used bino- 

 mial names ; their species bad consequently no standing ; but 

 they furnished to Gmelin in 1788 the same* bases of formally 

 named species of the thirteenth edition of the "Systema 

 Naturae,'' that Catesby and Edwards had afforded Linnaeus 

 in 1 758 and 1766. Pennant treated upward of 500 nominal 

 species of North American birds. The events at large of 

 this brief but important period were the progress of Latham's 

 Supplement to his Synopsis, the first volume of which ap- 

 peared in 1787, though the second was not completed till 

 1801; the appearance in 1790 of Latham's "Index Ornitho- 

 Jogicus," in which his birds receive Latin names in due 

 form ; and the publication in 1788 of the thirteenth edition 

 of the "Systema Naturae," as just said, 



We arc so accustomed to sec "Linn." and "Gui." after the 

 names of our longest-known birds that we almost unconsci- 

 ously acquire the notion that Liunams and Gmelin were 

 great discoverers or describers of Mrds in those days. But 

 the men who made North American ornithology what it was 

 during the last century were Catesby, Edwards, Foster, Pen- 

 nant, Latham and Bartram. For "the illustrious Swede" 

 was in this case little more than a methodical cataloguer, or 

 systematic indexer; while his editor, Gmelin, was merely an 

 industrious, indiscriminate compiler aud transcriber. Neither 

 of these men dixcoured anything to speak of. 

 (1791-1800.) 



T'hc Bartramian Period. — William Bartram's figure in the 

 events we are sketching is a notable one — rather more on ac- 

 count of his bearing upon Wilson's subsequent career, than 

 of his own actual achievements. Wilson is often called 

 "the father of American ornithology;" if this designation be 

 apt, then Bartram may be styled its godfather. Few are 

 fully aware how much Wilson owed to Bartram, his "guide, 

 philosopher and friend," who published in 1791 his "Travels 

 through North and South Carolina," containing much orni- 

 thological matter that was novel and valuable, including a 

 formal catalogue of the birds of the Eastern United States, 

 in which many species are named as new. I have always 

 contended that those of his names which are identifiable are 

 available, though Bartram frequently lapsed from strict 

 binomial propriety; and tbe question furnishes a bone of con- 

 tention to this day. Many birds which Wilson first fully 

 described and figured were really named by Bartram, and 

 several of the latter's designations were simply adopted by 

 Wilson, who, in relation to Bartram, is as the broader and 

 clearer stream to its principal tributary affluent. The notable 

 "Travels," freighted with its unpretending yet almost por- 

 tentous bird matter, went through several editions and at 

 least two translations; and I consider it the foundation of a 

 distinctively American school of ornithology. 



We have seen, in several earlier periods, that men's names 

 appear in pairs, if not also as mates. Thus, Catesby and 

 Edwards; Linnaeus and Gmelin; Pennant and Latham ; and, 

 perhaps, Buffon and Brisson. The Bartramian alter ego is 

 not Wilson, but Barton, whose "Fragments of the Natural 

 History of Pennsylvania," 1799, closed the period, which 

 Bartram had opened, and with it the century also. Benja- 

 min Smith Barton's tract, a folio now very scarce, is doubly 

 a "fragment," being at once a work never finished, and very 

 imperfect as far as it went ; but it is one of the most notable 

 special treatises of the last century, and I think the first 

 book published in this country that is entirely devoted to 

 ornithology. But its author's laurels must rest mainly upon 

 this count, for its influence or impression upon the course of 

 events is scarcely to be recognized — is incomparably less 

 than that made by Bartram's "Travels" and bis mentorship 

 of Wilson. 



By the side of Bartram and Barton stand several lesser 

 figures in the picture of this period. Jeremy Belknap treated 

 the birds of New Hampshire in his "History" of that State 

 (1792). Samuel Williams did like service for those of Ver> 

 mont in his "History" (1794). Samuel Hearne, a pioneer 

 ornithologist in the northerly part of America, foreshadowed 

 as it were, the much later "Fauna Boreali- American a" in 

 the nai-rative of his journey from Hudson's Bay to the 

 Northern Ocean — a stout quarto published in 1795, Here a 

 chapter of fifty pages is devoted to about as many species of 

 birds; and Hearnc's observations have a value which "time, 

 the destroyer," has not yet wholly effaced. 



The Wilsonian Epoch: 1800-1824. 



(1800-1808.) 



The Vieillotian Period. — As we round the turn of the cen- 

 tury a great work occupies the opening years, before the ap- 

 pearance of Wilson, a work by a foreigner, a Frenchman, 

 almost unknown to or ignored by his contemporaries in 

 America, although he was already tbe author of several illus- 

 trated works on ornithology, when, in 1807, bis "Histoire 

 Naturelle des Oiseaux de 1'Amerique Septentrionale" was 

 completed in two large folio volumes, containing more than 

 a hundred engraving, with text relating to several hundred 

 species of birds of North America and the West Indies; 

 many of them figured for the first time are entirely new to 

 science. This work, bearing much the same relation to its 

 times that Catesby's and Edwards's respectively did to theirs, 

 is said to have been published in twenty-two parts of six 

 plates each, probably during several years ; but the date of 

 its inception I have never been able to ascertain. However 

 this may be, Vieillot alone and completely fills a period of 

 eight years, during which no other notable or even mention- 

 able treatise upon North American birds saw the light, 

 Vieillot's case is an exceptionable one. As the author of 

 numerous splendidly illustrated works, all of which live; of 

 a system of ornithology, most of the generic names contained 

 in which are ingrained in the science; of very extensive ency- 

 clopaedic work by which hundreds of species of birds receive 

 new technical names ; Vieillot has a fame which time rather 

 brightens than obscures. Yet it is to be feared that the 

 world was unkind during his lifetime. At Paris, he stood in 

 the shadow of Cuvier's great name; Temminck assailed him 

 from Holland; while, as to his work upon our birds, many 

 years passed before it was appreciated or in any way ade- 

 quately recognized. Thus, singularly, so great a work as 

 the "Histoire Naturelle" — one absolutely characteristic of a 

 period — had no appreciable effect upon the course of events 

 till long after the times that saw its birth, when Cassin, 

 Baird and others brought Vieillot into proper perspective. 

 There is so little trace of Vieillot during the Wilsonian and 

 Audubouian epochs, that his "Birds of North America" 

 may almost be said to have slept for half a century. But to- 

 day, the solitary figure of the Vieillotian period stands out in 

 bold relief. 



(1808-1834.)! 



The Wilsonian Period.— -The "Paisley weaver;" "the Scotch 

 pedler;" the "melancholy poet-naturalist;" the "father of 

 American ornithology"— strange indeed are the guises of 

 genius, yet stranger its disguises in the epithets by which 

 we attempt to label and pigeon-bole that thing which has no 

 name, but its own, no place but its own. Alexander Wilson 

 had genius, and not much of anything else— very little 

 learning, scarcely any money, not many friends, and a paltry 

 share of "the world's regard" while he lived. But genius 

 brings a message which men must hear, and never tire of 

 hearing; it is the word that comes when the passion that 

 conceives is wedded with the patience that achieves. Wil- 

 son was a poet by nature, a naturalist by force of circum- 

 stances, an American ornithologist by mere accident— that 

 is if anything can be accidental in the life of a man of 

 genius. As a poet, he missed greatness by those limitations 

 of passion which seem so sad and unaccountable; as the 

 naturalist, he achieved it by the patience that knew no lim- 



itation till deatli interposed. As between the man and his 

 ■works, tbe very touchstone of genius is there ; for the man 

 was greater than all his works are. Genius may do that 

 which satisfies all men, but never that which satisfies itself; 

 for its inspiration is infinite and divine, its accomplishment 

 finite and human. Such is the penally of its possession. 



Wilson made, of course, the epoch in which his work up 

 peared, and I cannot restrict the Wilsonian period otherwise 

 than by giving to Vieillot his own. The period of Wilson's 

 actual authorship was brief, it began in September, 1808, 

 when the first volume of the "American Ornithology" ap 

 peared, and was cut short by death before the work was 

 finished. Wilson, having been born July 5, 1766, and ecme 

 to America in 1794, died August 23, 1813, when the seventh 

 volume was finished ; the eighth and ninth being completed in 

 1814 by his friend and editor, George Ord. But from this 

 time to 1824, when Bonaparte began to write, the reigning 

 work was still Wilson's, nothing appearing during these 

 years to alter the complexion of American ornithology ap- 

 preciably. Wilson's name overshadows nearly the whole 

 epoch— not that others were not then great, but that he was 

 so much greater. This author treated about 280 species, 

 giving faithful descriptions of all, and colored illustrations 

 of most of them. There are numerous editions of his work, 

 of which the principal are Ord's, 1828-9, in three volumes; 

 Jameson's, 1831, in four: Jardine's, 1832, in three, and Brew- 

 er's, 1840, in one; all of these, excepting of course the first 

 one, containing Bonaparte's "American Ornithology" and 

 other matter foreign to the original "Wilson." In 1814, 

 just as "Wilson" was finished, appeared the history of the 

 memorable expedition under Lewis and Clarke— an expedi- 

 tion which furnished some material to Wilson himself, as 

 witness Lewis' Woodpecker, Clarke's Crow and the "Louisi- 

 ana" Tanager; and more to Ord, who contributed to the sec- 

 ond edition of "Guthrie's Geography," an article upon orni- 

 thology. Ord's prominence in this science, however, rests 

 mainly upon his connection with Wilson's work, as already 

 noted. Near the close of the Wilsonian period, Thomas Say 

 gave us important notices of Western birds, upon the basis 

 of material acquired through Long's expedition to the Rocky 

 Mountains, the account of which appeared in 1823. In this 

 work, Say describes sundry species of birds new to science; 

 but he was rather an entomologist than an ornithologist, and 

 bis imprint upon our subject is scarcely to be found outside 

 the volume just named. 



A noted — some might say rather notorious — character ap- 

 pears upon the scene during this period, in the person of C. 

 S. Rafinesque, who appears to have been a genius, but one 

 so awry that it is difficult to do aught else than misunder- 

 stand him, unless we confess that we scarcely understand 

 him at all. In the elegant vernacular of tbe present day he 

 would be called a crank; but I presume that term means that 

 kind of genius which fails of interpretation ; for an unsuc- 

 cessful genius is a crank, and a successful crank is a genius. 

 For the rest, the Wilsonian period was marked by great ac- 

 tivity in Arctic exploration, in connection with the ornitho- 

 logical results of which appear prominently the names of 

 William E. Leach and Edward Sabine. 



As illustrating the relation between Wilson and Bartram, 

 which I have already pointedly mentioned, 1 may quote a 

 few bnes from Ord's "Life of Wilson,"* 



* "His schoolhouse and residence being: but a short distance from 

 Bartram*s Botanic Garden, situated on the west bank of the Schuyl- 

 kill, a sequestered spot, possessing attractions of no ordinary kind ; 

 an acquaintance was soon contracted with that venerable naturalist, 

 Mr. William Bartram, which grew Into an uncommon friendship, and 

 continued without the least abatement until severed by death. Here 

 it was that WiLson found himself translated, if we may so speak, into 

 a. new existence. He had long been a lover of the works of Nature, 

 and had derived more happiness from the contemplation of her sim- 

 ple beauties, than from any other source of gratification. But he had 

 hitherto been a mere novice: he was now about to receive instruc- 

 tions from one whom the experiences of a long life, spent in travel 

 and rural retirement, had rendered qualified to teach. . . From 

 his youth Wilson had been an observer of the manners of birds; .and 

 since his arrival in America he had found them objects of uncommon 

 interest; but he had not yet viewed them with the eye of a natural- 

 ist." This was about 1800— rather a little later. Wilson's "novitiate" 

 was the Vieillotian period, almost exactly. Bartram survived until 

 July 22, 1823, his eighty-fourth year; the date of his death thus coin- 

 ciding very nearly with the close of the Wilsonian epoch and period. 



[TO BE CONCLUDED.] 



Testing Deuteronomy. — One of the most singular things 

 I ever heard about birds was related to me by a friend who 

 has long been an ardent student of ornithology, and of the 

 Scriptures as well. In the course of his reading he camb 

 across a chapter in Deuteronomy which embraces "sundry 

 laws and regulations," and found his attention attracted to 

 the. following verses : ' 'If a bird's nest chance to be before 

 thee in any tree or on the ground, whether they be young 

 ones or eggs, and the dam sitting upon the young or upon 

 the eggs, thou shalt not take the dam witb the young: But 

 thou shalt in any wise let the dam go and take the young to 

 thee, that it may be well witb thee, and that thou mayst 

 prolong thy days. " This passage puzzled him a good deal; 

 so, with true scientific ardor, he set out to break its injunc- 

 tion, and try to find out why it was made. It being nesting 

 time for tbe birds he had no particular difficulty in finding 

 what he sought, and soon returned with a female bird and a 

 nest with four young ones in it, put them all together in a 

 cage, and, after supplying them with food and water, left 

 them for the night. In the morning mother and young 

 were found lying dead together, though without any marks 

 of violence upon them whatever, or anything to indicate 

 why they had died. Evidently something was wrong here, 

 so he went out and caught another family, put the mother 

 in one cage and the young in another, and gave them sepa- 

 rate rooms, although not removing them so far apart but 

 that they could hear each other in case one or the other 

 should cry out. The next morning all the birds were fouud 

 dead as before. Again the student went out, and again 

 came back with a capture, and this time he put the young 

 birds in the garret and the old one in the cellar, but although 

 neither mother nor offspring could hear each others' cries, 

 the coming morning showed the same result. He then 

 went out and captured a nest of birds, but let the mother 

 go, and successfully raised the entire brood. In each case 

 the variety of bird was the same —the rose-breasted grosbeak, 

 which is one of the strongest and easiest to rear of all New 

 England species. The reason of this strange occurrence does 

 not appear, but of one thing my friend is convinced, and 

 that is that Moses was the first agitator for a Society for the 

 Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and that he knew what 

 he was talking about when he discussed birds. — Sun. 



The Philadelphia Zoological Society has issued its 

 twelfth annual report, which shows the institution to be in 

 a most satisfactory condition. The success of tbe Zoological 

 Gardens is due in a very large measure to the efficiency of 

 the superintendent. Mr. Arthur Erwiu Brown. 



