BY WAY OF APPENDIX. 
I TRUST that no one will regard me as an inter- 
loper; for although it must be owned that I am 
one from foreign parts writing in England of 
British birds, this is not intended as a serious con- 
tribution to ornithology. Nor that any one will 
say that I am adding to a class of books of which 
we have too many already — a criticism, by the way, 
or something in place of one, which is often enough 
passed on the work of those who write popular 
essays on bird life. My private opinion on this 
vexed question is, that so long as the books prove 
good of their kind, there cannot be too many of 
them. I only wish that there were ten times as 
many, that they were ten times as popular, and 
formed part of the reading of every man, woman, 
and child in the kingdom. But this question does 
not concern me in the slightest. I am not com- 
peting — I am not so presumptuous as to dream of 
such a thing — with the makers of popular bird 
