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THE VERTEBRATA OF SUTHERLAND. 



A Vertebrate Fauna of Sutherland, Caithness, and West Cromarty. By 



John A. Harvie-Brown, F.R.S.E., F.Z.S., and T. E. Buckley, B.A., F.Z.S. 



Edinburgh: David Douglas, 8vo, xii-r344 pages, illustrated title-page, 

 numerous plates, plain and coloured, and map. 



Although its typographical errors are somewhat too numerous, the 

 work before us is one of the most superbly got-up of its kind that 

 Ave have seen. It is handsomely printed, tastefully bound, and most 

 appropriately illustrated. There is not only an excellent map on 

 paper tenacious enough to make it capable of being unfolded, and a 

 couple of panoramic views of scenery on tracing-Hnen, but illustrations 

 of scenery associated with bird-life, of birds, nests and eggs from local 

 specimens, and two exquisite reproductions of monochrouie sketches 

 accompany the chapter on fishes. 



The work itself is based upon the personal experience of its two 

 well-known authors, and embodies also such information as they have 

 been able to gather from other sources — including in particular the 

 posthumous notes of Henry Osborne of Wick (of whom a brief 

 memoir is given). The work includes the whole vertebrate fauna of 

 the district, and the plan of giving a list of the whole British 

 vertebrate fauna, and indicating those species which occur in the area 

 dealt with, is here adopted. This plan has the manifest advantage 

 of demonstrating the relationship of the smaller fauna to the larger 

 one of which it is but a part — and of recalling to mind the directions 

 in which further research should be prosecuted. The information is 

 given separately for each county under each species, excepting only 

 in cases where the species is expressly stated to be common in both. 

 The information is very fully given, with details of occurrence, notices 

 of the local names, and many interesting notes of all kinds. An 

 interesting account of the nesting of the Snow Bunting at Coire nan 

 t' sneadhaidh is accompanied by a view of the place, a coloured figure 

 of the bird, and a list of the alpine plants growing near. Full 

 attention is given to the bibliography of the subject, and no pains 

 are spared by the authors to elucidate in the fullest manner every 

 aspect of their subject, the physical aspect and the faunal position of 

 their district, an elaborate account of their sources of information, 

 and references are also made to the extinct species. We should like, 

 however, to have seen a summary, numerical and -otherwise, of the 

 whole fauna as compared with that of Great Britain or of Scotland ; 

 and we note in the preface, that the work, ' unlike most local Faunas, 

 ' lays aside to a great extent political boundaries, and is marked out 

 ' by otliers, much more natural, such as watersheds. This, w^e think, 

 ' is a new departure," but one which we imagine will commend itself 



Naturalist, 



