THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
1834; completed in 12 parts before Jan. 1836. Tlien again reprinted successively in 
1840 and again in 1844, when a Supplement to Murray’s Encyclopaedia of Geography 
was published separately in Jan. 1844, price one shilling, comprising 16 pages of statis¬ 
tical details only, no more Natural History. 
Butov , Sittdla , n.n. 
Encyclopaedia of Zoology. “ One thick octavo volume with numerous woodcuts 
now nearly ready for press.” Note in Fauna Boreali-Amer. Zool., p. 200, 1831-1832. 
This project was abandoned when Swainson accepted the editorship of the Natural 
History Volumes of Lardner’s Cabinet Cyclopaedia, which occupied fifteen volumes of 
that work :— 
No. 59. Prelim. Discourse Study Nat. History Sept. 1834. 
66. Nat. Hist, and Classif. Animals May 1835. 
72. Quadrupeds Oct. 1835. 
83. Birds, Vol. I. Oct. 1st, 1836. 
92. Vol. II. [July 1st] June 1837. 
98. Animals in Menageries Dec. 31st, 1837. 
109. Nat. Hist, of Fishes, Amphibians, Vol. I. Oct. 1838. 
116. Vol. II. July 1839. 
120. Habits and Instincts of Animals Dec. 1839. 
123. Malacology or Shells and Shellfish May 1840. 
126. Taxidermy, Bibliography and Biography July 1840. 
129. History and Natural Arrangement of Insects, with 
J. Strickland Dec. 1840. 
The other three volumes were on Geology, two volumes by J. Philips, and Principles 
of Descriptive and Physiological Botany by J. Henslow. These were issued with a 
sub-title Cabinet of Natural History, and the wording on the engraved title-page differs, 
and copies may be met with with all three titles or only one. and also different 
bindings. 
Swainson considered this his great opportunity and expounded throughout the 
series Macleay's Quinary Theory. In order to elaborate this he was compelled to 
look carefully at the birds, and he drew the details himself, being a very gifted artist. 
Swainson’s drawings have been copied into text books ever since, adorning Newton’s 
Dictionary of Birds as recently as 1896. 
One of the peculiarities of this series is the misspellings, sometimes two misspellings 
of his own genus name occurring on the same page. A studied opinion was rendered 
on this subject by the International Commission, who were ignorant of the fact that 
Swainson himself had written in reply to a criticism (Mag. Nat. Hist. (Charlesworth) 
n.s., Vol. II., p. 498, 1838) : “ To ‘ errors and misprints ’ I believe I must plead guilty ; 
it is a fault I always have had, and am afraid I alwa}^ shall have.” 
The volumes in this Cyclopaedia to be studied are : 
Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural History. 
No new names in it. 
On the Natural History and Classification of Birds, 2 vols., Oct. 1st, 1836 (June), 
July 1st, 1837. 
Full of new genera and species, some occurring in the first volume as vomina nuda 
and validated in the second volume, others occurring in the second volume as nomina 
nuda and validated in the Animals in Menageries (q.v.). 
Catheturus with C. australis , Ptilonopus leucogaster, Dendrocygna, Lophorynclius , 
Macropygia , Geopelia, Gavia , Dasypiilus , Nyctiardea , Cereopsis australis , Golluricincla 
strigata. Praticola with P. anthoides (n.n.), Eopsaltria jlavicollis , Brachystoma with 
B. cinerea, Scythrops australis , Menura paradisea , Plyctolophus erythropterus, Sittdla , 
Climacteris auricomis , Eudynamys australis , Ptilotis with P. lewinii, Zanthomiza , 
Gliciphila , Leptoglossus with L. cucullatus , Meliphaga barbata, Gymnophrys with G. 
torquatus, Eidopsarus with E. bicinctus (Philedon buceroides), Dicceum sanguinea , 
132 
