REVIEW. 
PART II. 
REVIEWS AND EXTRACTS. 
801 
REVIEW. 
OUTLINE OF THE SMALLER BRITISH BIRDS. 
BY R. A. SLANEY, KSQK. M. P. — 8/0. FOOLSCAP, 4.'.. Gd. CT.OTH. 
This we have found a very entertaining little book on our Smaller British Birds, 
evidently well suited to interest the minds of youug persons, for whom it is 
chiefly intended. Its subtsance is gathered from some of the best books on those 
subjects, and is pleasingly blended with many original remarks, and the rela- 
tion of several very interesting incidents, which led the Author to make some of 
his observations. Our feathered gentry are divided into three sets : — winter visi- 
tors, summer visitors, and sojourners or resident birds. The winter visitors in- 
clude field-fares, redwings, starlings, cross-bills, winter yellow wagtails, snow-bun- 
tings, and mountain finches. It has, we believe, been satisfactorily ascertained, 
that the snow-bunting and the lesser mountain finch, are one and the same bird, 
varying only in colour and markings, from a difference in age or sex, or from 
the effects of the seasons. The old males in summer plumage are the snow-bun- 
tings; the yoi/H<7 males and oW females, are the tawny-buntings; and the great 
pied mountain finches, and the young birds of the same year, both male and fe- 
male, are the lesser mountain finches, and bramblins. These differ materially, 
however, from the common brambling, (Fringilla montifriugilla, Lin.) which 
may every winter be met with in company vvith the chaffinches. 
The summer visitors, include about twenty seven species. The sojourners, 
include nearly forty of our smaller birds, the families of owls and hawks; also 
the different tribes of water birds, as the families of ducks, divers, gulls, and wa- 
ders. It is illustrated with a dozen engravings, and is upon the whole very neatly 
gut up. There is, however, one very important deficiency, the want of an index ; 
had the birds mentioned in the work been arranged together at the end, in a 
sort of systematic catalogue, with the scientific names, and reference to page, 
&c. which might have been done in a very small compass, it would have been 
of much advantage. We think this has been omitted rather inadvertently, as 
on looking the pages over again, we find page 4 in a note these words, " At the 
end we insert a systematic catalogue of all those birds within our limits," which 
seems to prove, that something of the sort was in contemplation. We have not 
advanced this merely to find fault ; for we much approve of the work, and would 
most certainly recommend it to the perusal of all our young friends, as an inter- 
esting companion in their daily walks. 
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