260 
Letters , Announcements, fyc. 
Limb or g had hitherto done very well. His “ first consign¬ 
ment, of some 200 birdskins, a few small mammals, reptiles, 
and fisheSj and a lot of good insects, arrived a few days since, 
showing that he must have worked hard. We are going to 
send him another and better taxidermist. The duplicates 
will be sold to help expenses; and those who apply first will 
have the first choice.” 
Pitta versus Brachyurus. —Mr. Elliot, in his well-known 
monograph, uses the generic term Brachyurus for the great 
body of Pittas, i. e. those with short tails, and confines Pitta 
to the sharp-tailed section, containing P. cyanura and others. 
But there is no doubt this practice is indefensible. Pitta, 
as originally established in 1816 by Vieillot (Analyse, p. 42), 
is defined as =“ Breve” of Buffon. Now Buffon’s (( Breve” 
contained only four species, all belonging to the short-tailed 
division. 
Again, the type of Brachyurus, founded by Thunberg in 
1821 (K. Yet. Ak. Handl. 1821, p. 370), is Turdus triostegus 
of the Museum Carlsonianum, which = Pitta hengalensis 
of the short-tailed section. Therefore Brachyurus—Pitta, 
and these names cannot be used for different genera. 
Name of Falco dickinsoni. —In the first volume of his Cata¬ 
logue of Birds (p. 447) Mr. Sharpe has altered the specific 
name of the Ealcon described and figured in f The Ibis 3 for 
1864, and called dickinsoni (after its discoverer, the late Hr. 
John Dickinson, of the Oxford and Cambridge Central-African 
Mission), to “ dickersoni.” This he appears to have done in 
consequence of what Mr. Gurney has stated, Ibis, 1869, p. 444. 
But I believe Mr. Gurney must have been mistaken. With 
the late Dr. Dickinson himself I never had the good fortune 
to be acquainted, but on referring to the correspondence which 
I had with his brother, Mr. B. Dickinson, of Jarrow-upon- 
Tyne, I find that my version of the family name is undoubt¬ 
edly correct. I must add that Mr. Sharpe ought, in my 
opinion, to have stated in his f Catalogue J the grounds upon 
which the change was made, as it might otherwise have been 
supposed to be a typographical error.—P. L. S. 
