Recent Literature. 
227 
1883.] 
jkcmt literature. 
Goss’s Birds of Kansas.* — As is doubtless well-known to most of the 
readers of the Bulletin, Colonel Goss recently gave to the State of Kan- 
sas his large collection of mounted birds, including not only those of the 
State, but many obtained on various distant expeditions, including visits 
to Labrador, the Pacific coast, Mexico, and Central America; and he has 
now very appropriately supplemented his gift by a carefully annotated list, 
of the birds of the State, prepared at the request and under the direction 
of the State Executive Council. His twenty-six years’ residence in Kan- 
sas, and his well-known abilities as an ornithologist, give him an unusual 
fitness for the work, and the expectation these facts naturally inspire of a 
thoroughly trustworthy list from his hands. is fully supported by an exam- 
ination of the list itself. His commendable conservatism in the matter 
has led him to exclude a few species previously given as birds of Kansas, 
the evidence on which they were included not proving to him satisfactory. 
The extent of his field work may be inferred from the fact that very few 
species are given on other authority than his own observations, and in 
these cases he has thoroughly satisfied himself of the correctness of their 
inclusion. Under these restrictions the list includes 320 species and races, 
161 of which are marked as known to breed. The annotations are brief 
but pertinent, distinguishing carefully the manner of occurrence in the 
State, but without indicating dates of arrival and departure of the mi- 
grants. While we notice a few typographical errors (corrected by an 
errata - slip subsequently issued), the list as a whole is neatly and carefully 
printed, and attains in general a high grade of excellence. It closes with 
a supplementary list of 29 species of “Birds to be looked for in Kansas.” 
Doubtless, all of these, and probably others, will ere long be detected; 
indeed we are surprised that a few of those here given have not already 
been met with.f The large number of species ultimately to be found 
(probably not less then 350) in Kansas naturally results not less from its 
great area (extending as it does through over 400 miles of longitude) , 
than from its having in its eastern third the charactistic birds of the East, 
while its western half includes those of the Great Plains. — J. A. A. 
Beckham’s Birds of Nelson County. Kentucky.^ — Mr. Beckham’s 
*A Catalogue of the Birds of Kansas. By N. S. Goss. Published under the direc- 
tion of the Executive Council. Topeka, Kansas : Kansas Publishing House, 1883. 
8vo, pp. iv+34. 
f Since the above was written a letter frotn Col. Goss calls our attention to the fact 
of his accidental omission from the list of Icteria virens longicandata , recorded by 
Prof. Snow as taken on the Smoky-hill River in Western Kansas, this variety appear- 
ing in his enumeration of birds to be looked for. 
£A List of the Birds of Bardstown, Nelson County, Kentucky. By Charles Wickliffe 
Beckham. Journ. Cincinnati Soc. Nat. Hist., Vol. VI, pp. 136-147, July, 1883. 
