Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, §c. 213 
or uncoloured. Contrast that with the non-appreciation of a 
picture by Arabs or certain other races of human kind ! 
“ Well, in your No. 8, p. 323, I demolished a luckless Mon¬ 
sieur Payen, who cheerfully fancied that he had made a grand 
discovery about the comestible birds'-nests. Now it comes to 
the turn of my good and exceedingly respected friend, Robert 
F. Tomes, Esq., who tells us (p. 318) that, as far as he knows, / 
‘ the name of Professor Macgillivray stands alone in justification 
of the alleged Fringilline affinities' of the so-called Bearded 
Titmouse. 
“ Now, it does so happen that the very first ornithological 
essay I ever committed to writing in my life was about this 
very bird, which I called ‘ Bearded Reedling,' and not Tit, or 
Titmouse. This was in 1832, in the first number of Rennie's 
‘ Field-Naturalist's Magazine,' wherein I made my debut as a 
scribbler in Natural-History matters. I have had much to 
answer for since then ! But, however that may be, it seems 
that I do not happen to have this particular number handy to 
refer to at this instant ; nevertheless I recommend those who 
possess the opportunity to revert to it, because they will find 
some sound and direct personal observations on the habits of 
the ‘ Bearded Reedling,’ whose affinities I at that time thought 
were Shrikish. By the way, this species is ‘the Least Butcher¬ 
bird' of Goldsmith's ‘ Animated Nature, 5 in which I suppose 
that the agreeable author of ‘The Traveller' and the ‘Deserted 
Village' copied Buffon as usual. 
“However, in that same ‘Field-Naturalist's Magazine' for 
April 1833, p. 190 et seq., in returning to the charge, I would 
not listen to anything about affinity with Parus, and I think 
that it may be discerned that even then my notions were already 
approximating Finch- ward. 
“In 1838 I took a part in a new translation of Cuvier's 
‘ Regne Animal,' wherein, if you refer to p. 198, you will find 
that I assert of the Reedlings ( Panurus seu Calamophilus) that 
‘ their anatomy is strictly that of a Finch; and they are much 
more nearly related to the Waxbill-Finches than to the Tits, 
with which latter they have little in common. The gullet has 
an extremely long dilatation, or craw, and the gizzard is remark- 
