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Since the appearance of Samuel’s book in 1S67, there has been a 
great increase in the interest taken in the study of American Orni¬ 
thology, and books and papers have appeared too numerous to men¬ 
tion, with the exception of a few of the most important. I11 1S70 was 
published by the Geological Survey of California a volume by Dr. J. 
G. Cooper, on the ornithology of the west coast of America, 
which Professor Baird calls by far the most important contribu¬ 
tion to the biography of American birds since the time of Audu¬ 
bon. In 1S74 the first three volumes were issued of the great 
work of Baird, Brewer and Ridgeway, on North American 
birds—a work which will long remain the standard authority upon 
the subject. The first two of these authors were friends of Audubon, 
and new species were named by him in their honor. The two 
remaining volumes on the water birds are now passing through the 
press, and will be published as a part of the ornithology in the 
Geological Survey of California, just mentioned, and will also 
appear in the Memoirs of‘the Museum of Comparative Zoology. 
The source of a great part of the information contained in these 
volumes has been the very copious notes and valuable collections 
in the possession of the Smithsonian Institution. 
According to Professor Baird, 4 4 before the appearance of the work 
of Audubon (who went himself, however, to the Upper Missouri in 
1843, and met there with a few new species,) nearly all that was 
known of the great region of the United States west of the Missouri 
river, was the result of the journey of Lewis and Clarke up the Mis¬ 
souri and across to the Pacific coast, and that of John K. Townsend 
and Mr. Nuttall, both of whom made some collections and brought 
back notices of the country, which however they were unable to 
explore to any great extent. The entire region of Texas, New 
Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada and California was unvisited, 
as was also a great portion of territory north of the United States 
boundary, including British Columbia and Alaska.” 
The ornithology of those regions is now no longer unknown, and 
fresh information is constantly added by numerous observers, often 
army officers and those engaged in the government surveys, but, 
owing to the vast extent of our country, there still remains much to be 
done and plenty of interesting and important facts to be ascertained 
about the local distribution, times of arrival and departure, and 
other habits of our birds, even in regard to those of the Atlantic 
