PREFACE. 
production of tliis work has given me the greatest pleasure for the 
past quarter of a centimy, during which time I also got together my 
unique collection of Australian birds, and books relating to ornithology. T 
should have liked the collection of birds to go to Australia, and much regretted 
that at the time I made the offer it was not possible to arrange for this. It 
now forms part of the Rothschild Collections at Tring, where it is available to 
all those interested in ornithology. 
I msh to place on record here the debt of gratitude I owe to the many 
friends who have done so much to help me in my work, and without whose 
assistance I could not have undertaken and concluded so long a series of 
volumes. Their names, which are too numerous to mention here, will be 
found in the difierent volumes of my work, but I should like specially to thank 
the authorities of the Natural History Museum, whose help and courtesy made 
my work at South Kensington a real delight; Lord Rothschild, whose kindly 
help and counsel, especially in the early days of my work, meant very much 
to me, as did the assistance of Dr. Ernst Hartert, in the museum at Tring ; 
my private secretary, Mr. Tom Iredale, for years of hard work; my publishers, 
Messrs. Witherby, for the excellent work throughout; and the artists whose 
beautiful plates add such a charm to the work. 
In the liistory of Austrahan ornithology there is, of course, no pre-Linnean 
period, and the birds described by Liime himself are only those that are common 
both to Europe and Australia. With Linn4 is included Gmehn, except when 
the latter gave Latin names to birds described by Latham. 
The Lathamian period is really the startuig point of Austrahan bird- 
history. Latham described about eighty species ; then come Vigors and 
Horsfield, leading up to the Gouldian period, with the help of occasional 
descriptions from different workers. Even at this time our ornithology was 
sthl in its infancy. 
It was not until the Catalogues of the Birds in the British Museum were 
inaugurated that any representative efiort was made to bring together all 
synonymy. 
In the twentieth century, tri-nomial nomenclature was first consistently 
used, and in 1905, with the pubhcation of the International Rules, Austrahan 
XI. 
