242 
Recent Literature. 
It is my earnest hope and desire that my declaration may not provoke 
further controversy or correspondence. — Henry D. Minot. 
[Mr. Minot has expressed his peculiar views with such naivete, that his 
letter may, in a general way, be taken as its own answer. It would be 
gratuitous at this late day to essay any elaborate defence of the established 
systems of work which he rejects, but there are certain important state- 
ments resting on his authority, which it is fitting to reconsider in the 
light of their author’s avowed methods and principles. Many of our 
readers will remember the very complimentary notice of the “Land and 
Game Birds of New England ” which appeared in a former volume of this 
Bulletin : the high authority from which it emanated undoubtedly gave it 
much weight and possibly silenced the other critics ; at least, the book 
has never been reviewed on its merits, and things which should have been 
severely censured, have passed nearly unchallenged, up to the present 
time. The precedent is too dangerous to be allowed to stand. 
A few prominent examples will suffice to point the moral of what I 
have to say. 
In the “Land and Game Birds” Mr. Minot speaks of finding near 
Boston such nests as the Northern Water Thrush’s, the Cape May War- 
bler’s, the Blackburnian Warbler’s, the Short-eared Owl’s and the Pigeon 
Hawk’s. Now it might be reasonably supposed that the importance of 
any one of these discoveries would have called for the very strictest iden- 
tification. Yet the text furnishes no assurance of this. On the contrary, 
the author does not even tell us that the birds were seen and in no instance 
is any evidence whatever, direct or circumstantial, advanced in support of 
their assumed identity. The descriptions of the nests and eggs, too, are so 
brief and general that they give little satisfaction. It may well be doubted 
if any of our older ornithologists would care to risk his reputation on such 
unsupported but entirely positive statements. Of course the sincerity of 
Mr. Minot’s convictions is not called in question ; but the school boy whose 
collection embraces alleged eggs of every species of Sparrow that breeds 
from Maine to Florida is equally sincere, though the parentage of most 
of his specimens may generally be safely referred to a few of the common 
kinds. The parallel may seem a harsh one, but the basis of identification 
is essentially the same in the two cases : viz., individual opinion. 
Now we fancy that there are many persons besides Mr. Minot whose 
feelings often revolt at the thought ot killing a harmless and confiding lit- 
tle bird. But if the importance of the case renders this necessary no one 
ought to hesitate. A bird’s life should count as nothing against the verifi- 
cation of a rare nest or the establishment of a new fact. A sombre-plum- 
aged Sparrow cannot always be recognized as it skulks through the 
undergrowth, or the females of many of our Warblers separated with 
certainty while sitting half-buried in their nests or flitting among the 
foliage. The collector may satisfy himself, especially if his imagination 
is allowed to supply some of the blanks, but he must not expect to satisfy 
others who know by experience the difficulties of such cases. If the nest in 
question is common and well known, especially if the eggs are in them- 
