308



Correspondence



The value of this innovation will be plain to everyone, for one

hearing of the natural song will do more to help students aud those

interested in birds to identify them by their song than pages of the

most careful and graphic description.


This is the pioneer publication in this branch of ornithology.

Mr. Nicholson is one of the foremost makers of bird censuses, witness

his excellent review of the Heron population, and he has broken new

ground here which is likely to be the forerunner of many similar

undertakings. The records which are sent out with the book include

the Nightingale, Cuckoo, Robin, Wren, Willow Warbler, and others,

and his book is valuable also for his recognition of the many causes of

song and his deductions and apt observations.


Mr. Koch is responsible for the actual recording, and was given

facilities for his work by Mr. Julian Huxley in the wild bird sanctuary

at Whipsnade. Altogether, the songs of fifteen British species of birds

have been obtained, and if worthily reproduced give a really correct

impression. Mr. Huxley contributes the foreword.


The publishers, Messrs. Witherby, are well-known pioneers in bird

study. They are, if not absolutely the inventors of the craft of bird¬

ringing, at any rate among its foremost exponents and practitioners.

Students all over the world will owe them a debt of gratitude for this

publication of a book with sound illustrations.


The book is issued in a box, which also contains the underlying

gramophone records. Its price is 15s. net.


E. F. C.



CORRESPONDENCE, NOTES, ETC.


STANLEY CRANES


Madam,— Mr. Ezra in his account of his success with these Cranes (p. 273)

says that he believes his young birds are the first to have ever been fully

reared in captivity. According to Crandall’s list in the New York Zool.

Society Bulletin, 1917, p. 1449, they were bred in the U.S.A. (before 1917)

and the young presumably reared, as is stated to have been the case with

all the species included in that list. This record appeared as No. 653 in

Records of Birds Bred in Captivity.


E. Hopkinsox.


BREEDING OF BLACK-CROWNED WAYBILLS


Madam, —Mrs. Wharton-Tigar, of Hampstead, has bred the Black-crowned

Waxbills ( Estrilda nonnula), which were imported last year for the first time

by Mr. Webb, from Cameroon. I saw the young, four of them, on

28th September, when they had been out of the nest over three weeks and

flying about the aviary, a small outdoor one, and all in perfect condition,

plump and sleek, exactly as if they had been wild-bred.


The breeder will, I hope, later write a full account, but I take this oppor¬

tunity to put on early record this noteworthy success.



E. Hopkinsox.



