8o 
Book Notices ajid Reviews. 
Miss IVIedland is as inucli at home in depicting the sattii iiiiie majesty 
of the Accipitres as she was with tlie silk}' gracefulness of the Warblers, and 
wlien we come to lier drawings of the Hobby and Kestrel in PauT X. we 
have a still further exposition of her powers of discrimination ))etween the 
expressions of different birds of even the same genus. The writer in his 
younger days has kept several specimens of both these birds in captivit}', 
and, on seeing the talented artist's portraiture of them, well recalls the 
benevolent pensiveness of the Hobby as contrasted with the grim slt-rnuess 
of the Kestrel. 
After the Phalacrocoracid^ and Snlidse, represented respectively by 
the Cormorant and Shag and the Gannet, we come to the Ardeidse, among 
which we note an article on the Purple Heron, accompanied by a figure of 
the bird, thus evidencing the catholicity of our Author, which is even more 
emphatically shewn by notices and plates of the White Stork and Glossy 
Ibis, both of these being only occasional migrants to our shores. 
Part XI. has unfortunately not come to hand, so no notice of it can 
be given. 
Part XII. is particularly interesting to both the purely field 
naturalist and the peculiar compound so often met with as half naturalist 
and half gunner, in as much as it deals with about a dozen of the Anatidae, 
beginning with the Ferruginous Duck and ending with the Smew. One of 
these birds, the Tufied Duck [Fuligula cristata), affords a remarkable 
instance of the changes tliat may occur in a bird's habits and range. We 
all know — unfortunately — of those changes which take the form of nearly 
total extinction of a species, videlicet the Dartford Warbler and the Raven, 
but in this case it is the other way about. Whereas this duck was only fiist 
recognised as breeding on the lake at Port Hall, Nottinghamshire, some 
sixty oi seventy years ago, as many as forty pairs nested on this lake alone 
in 1906, and it is now found to breed in ai least eleven other counties in 
Kngland, besides being very commonly distributed in both Ireland and 
Scotland, where also it is increasing in numbers. 
The illustrations in this part are particularly pleasing. The duck on 
water, as we usually see it portrayed, is only too often a beautifully modelled 
piece of wood. Miss Medland's ducks are alive. 
In this number, which by the way closes Vor.UME III-, is published a 
provisional list of subscribers. These so far reach the goodly number of 
close on nine hundred, a result which .shows how a really good book is 
appreciated, in spite of its not being issued at a popular price and advertized 
in the approved manner of the Times newspaper. 
Part XIII. opens with the Colunibidae, a family which, as may be 
readily imagined, especially lends itself to the seductions of our artist's 
brush. But she may fairly be said to have snrpa.ssed herself with the Sand 
Grouse, perhaps the most difficult bird in all creation of which to make a 
picture, which shall at the same time be absolutely true to nature and yet 
