viii PREFACE. 



The plates of this volume, we trust, will bear a strict com- 

 parison with any of the foregoing; and it is a source of infinite 

 regret to us, as we expect it will also be to the reader, that they 

 are so few. If the author had lived a short time longer, and had 

 been permitted by health, he would have completed drawings of 

 all the birds which he intended at present to delineate. There 

 are some which he would have been obliged to omit, in conse- 

 quence of the unhappy war in which our country is involved, pre- 

 venting a journey to those parts of Georgia and Louisiana where 

 only it would be practicable to obtain them. These, with strag- 

 glers, it was contemplated to give, at some future period, in a 

 supplement. 



The very day whereon Mr. Wilson was seized with his 

 last illness, he made out a list of those birds which he intended 

 should complete the work for the present. We transcribe it for 

 the satisfaction of the reader: 



Undraivriy Aug. 13, 1813. 



Gannet, Albatross, Crested Grebe, 



Young of dittOj Tropic Bird, Little Grebe, 



Frigate Pelican, Puffin, Black-backed Gull, 



Brown Pelican, Razor-bill, Skua Gull, 



Great White Pelican, Shearwater Petrel, Kittiwake Gull, 



Brown Booby, Blue Hawk, Herring Gull, 



Corvorant, Speckled Diver, Common Gull^ 



Canada Crane, Turkey, Swan. 

 Shag, 



