t^i4. Moffat. — Major G. E. H. Barreii-Hamilion. S7 
years, and two of these (that on Sabine's Snipe^ and on 
the Introduction of the Magpie into Ireland^) were of 
sufficient importance to be cited by Professor Newton in 
his Dictionary of Birds ; while those on the Irish Black 
Rat3 and Irish Stoat4 — in which, however, he had the 
co-operation respectively of Messrs. W. Eagle Clarke and 
Oldfield Thomas — possess an interest and authority that 
cannot be ignored. His contribution to the Clare Island 
Survey series^ is also a paper deserving close study ; and 
in some of his short notes isolated facts are brought to 
notice (such, for instance, as the coincidence of the Wexford 
and Pembrokeshire local names of the Corncrake^) that 
might otherwise long have escaped attention among those 
whom they would specially interest. 
Of the enormous number of subspecies that he has added 
to the list of European, Asiatic, and African mammals it 
may suffice to say that no man could be more willing than 
Barrett -Hamilton himself to admit that the amount of 
meaning which underlies his distinctions is open to the 
widest range of interpretation. He brought out his own 
point of view clearty and well in his reply" to some strictures 
from Dr. Lonnberg, of Upsala, who objected to his " splits " 
among the Hedgehogs and Weasels. " Even if I were to 
find that I had made numerous bad subspecies I would 
vastly prefer to be on the side of those who attempt to 
unravel the mysteries of variation . . . rather than 
to cultivate the icy scepticism of the modern school of 
lumpers, to whom the many phases of animal variation 
are like the ripples of the ocean to the navigator — things 
to be detested in proportion as their magnitude makes 
them troublesome." He did not care whether his splits 
were called subspecies, races, or phases, but insisted that 
they were, in any case, worth tracing out and recording. 
Be this as it may, it w^as an inestimable boon to the student 
of Irish zoology that the writing of what was to be the 
1 Irish Nat., 1895, P- 12. ■* Zool.. 1895, p. 124. 
^ Zqol., 1891, p. 247.. ^ Proc. R.I. Acad., vol. xxxi., pt. 17. 
^ Zool., 1891, p. I. ^ Zool., 1909, p. 30. 
Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (7) vol. vi., pp. 244-5. 
