Nov., 1913 
PUBLICATIONS REVIBWIiD 
235 
study exhibits Mrs. Bailey in her happiest 
vein. 
John Woodcock shows a splendid photo- 
graph of Sharp-tailed Grouse obtained by him 
in Manitoba and we rejoice with him, in a 
page and a half of print, that this difficult 
and decreasing bird has been brought to 
camera. Maunsell S. Crosby has a few crisp 
notes on a pair of Holboell Grebes captured 
and photographed at Rhinebeck, N. Y., and 
Arthur A. Allen of Ithaca details an enter- 
taining experience with a pair of nesting 
Blue-headed Vireos. 
The Migration and Plumage studies arc 
concerned this month with the Harris and 
the Golden-crowned Sparrows. In this con- 
nection we are pained to note a glaring in- 
accuracy in the descriptive title of the colored 
frontispiece. The plate in question is a w^ell 
executed piece by Louis Agassiz Fuertes de- 
picting an adult and an immature bird of each 
of the above-named species. The adult in each 
instance is labelled “adult male,” and the 
immature bird (whether male or female, mat- 
ters little) is declared to be an “adult fe- 
male.” Of course this blunder is not charge- 
able to Fuertes who knows his birds as wc 
know our letters, nor to Chapman who refers 
to the figures correctly in his text further on. 
It must be due, therefore to some irresponsible 
third party to whom this important task was 
entrusted. In a magazine which caters espe- 
cially to youth and from which our young 
people are likely to receive impressions which 
cannot be shaken off, such a misleading sign- 
board at the beginning of the path is peculi- 
arly unfortunate. 
In reviewing our own Condor ( July- August, 
1913) the veteran critic, “T. S. P.,” to whom 
we owe an ancient debt of gratitude for gen- 
erous consideration and liberal praise, de- 
votes considerable space to Dawson’s article, 
“The All-Day Test at Santa Barbara” and 
expresses his dissatisfaction wdth methods 
and tendencies therein displayed. In the first 
place he deprecates the use of the auto- 
mobile as an aid to bird study, though whether 
he considers that this device takes an un- 
fair advantage of the birds or whether he 
harbors the suspicion, in common with cer- 
tain clergymen, that “one of the automobile 
crowd” must, ipso facto, be addicted to high 
balls and therefore liable to see birds double, 
our reviewer fails to state. Moreover, he 
suspects the “accuracy of results when Sand- 
pipers, Linnets and Redwings are recorded 
by hundreds, when only eight meadowlarks 
and four English Sparrows were observed 
in comparison with 40 Black-headed Gros- 
beaks.” This is amazing, perhaps, to one not 
thoroughly conversant with local conditions 
at Santa Barbara; nevertheless we need only 
to remind “T. S. P.” who was a Californian 
that Sandpipers, Linnets and Redwings are 
precisely the birds one does see by hun 
dreds ; that Meadowlarks are busy feeding 
first broods by May 5th and so are silent and 
secretive ; that Black-headed Grosbeaks were 
excessively abundant last spring; and that 
presunialily because of the pre-occupation of 
the field by Linnets, the English Sparrows 
have never found effective or numerous 
lodgement in Santa Barbara. One has actually 
to hunt for them. Beyond this, however, there 
seems to be a real ground of misunderstand- 
ing as between Palmer and Dawson as to 
what constitutes the proper object of an all- 
day test. Dr. Palmer is influenced by the 
Bird-Lore census standards where enumera- 
tion of individuals has always been deemed 
tlie important thing. Dawson has always 
stood for the enumeration of species as the 
important thing in these all-day tests and he 
designated the results so obtained as horizons 
some time before “bird censuses” were talked 
of. The figures placed opposite the names 
in the Condor list were, therefore, approxi- 
mate and not intended for summation, al- 
though the writer was, perhaps, at fault in 
not having so noted. That this is the ground 
of misunderstanding appears further. “Rather 
it would seem that combined observations 
of several persons in a definite area where 
each could take time to cover his territory 
thoroughly and follow up and observe the 
various birds, would give a better idea of 
the number of species and individuals preseni 
on a given date.” No doubt, but that is to 
change essentially the character of the insti- 
tution under consideration and to criticise 
it not for what it is but for what it is not. 
An extended and painstaking census is one 
thing, and a very good one in its way, but a 
"bird horizon” is a different thing and also 
very good. In a bird horizon one tests not 
only the resources of a given region but he 
tests his own resources, his ability to find the 
birds and to recognize them when found un- 
der certain definite limitations of time. It 
is, confessedly, a sort of sporting proposi 
tion, bearing . about the same relation to the 
year’s work in ornithology that horse racing 
does to plowing. Plowing is doubtless to be 
commended both in man and beast, neverthe- 
less the evolution of the horse is supposed to 
owe more to the incentive of the track than 
to the ancient furrow. And, anyhow, bird 
horizoning as an occasional indulgence does 
give zest to the ornithological pursuits 
whether detailed or general. 
The value of such a magazine as Bird-Lore 
in bringing new talent to the front is clearly 
shown in an article describing “A Pet Road- 
runner,” by George Miksch Sutton, a lad of 
IS, Here is a clever, promising piece of 
work and we confidently expect to see “Mas- 
