128 
Letters, Announcements, ^c. 
for 1871, gives the best summary of what he has done to 
advance our knowledge of the Chinese avifauna. 
During the latter part of the time that Swinhoe was working 
at the birds of the Chinese littoral, the interior of the country 
was being most ably investigated by Pere Armand David; so 
that China, instead of being the terra incognita as regards 
our knowledge of its birds that it was twenty years ago, may 
now rank amongst the fairly explored countries of the globe. 
Swinhoe^s communications to this Journal commenced in 
1860, after which scarcely a number, and certainly no volume, 
appeared without a contribution to its pages from him. His 
last communication to us bears the date of the same month 
as that of his death; and the fine Formosan species there 
described and figured, from a specimen obtained by Prof. 
Steere, supplements his own important discoveries in the same 
island. 
Swinhoe was elected an Honorary Member of the British 
Ornithologists^ Union in 1862, and passed to the list of 
Ordinary Members at his own choice in 1876. He was a 
Member of several of the scientific societies of London, as 
well as a Fellow of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. He was 
elected a Fellow of the Boyal Society in 1876. It is much 
to be hoped that Mr. Swinhoe^s fine collection of Chinese 
birds may be kept together in its entirety, and find a home 
in some public institution or private museum where the 
specimens will remain accessible, as they always were in 
their late owner’s possession, to his brother workers in 
science. 
