1921 .] Obituary. 543 
named by Tristram after bis travelling companion, and 
obtained during their journey in Palestine; he was also 
the original discoverer of Passer moabiticus, which was only 
met with by the party on the eastern side of the Dead Sea, 
and is still a scarce bird in collections. 
J. H. Gurney. 
John Burroughs. 
John Burroughs, who died 29 March last, within a few 
days of his eighty-fourth birthday, was to America w'hat 
Gilbert White was to England. In natural history and in 
literature Burroughs covered a wider field than White, but 
both aroused in their readers an interest in the everyday 
life of garden, field, and forest about their homes. 
‘Wake Robin,’ Burroughs’ first book, was published 
about 1870, and his final work ‘Accepting the Universe 5 
appeared in the last year of his life. I 11 1871 he made a 
short visit to England, and the results of his observations 
here are recorded in ‘Winter Sunshine’ under the heading 
“ An October Abroad.” Some years later he made a longer 
stay in this country and devoted a volume, ‘ Eresh Fields,’ 
to describing his impressions of England and its bird-life. 
Although in no sense a technical naturalist, Burroughs 
was a careful and accurate observer, and his facility of 
expression gave to his essays a literary quality which won 
for him a much larger audience than is reached by the 
purely scientific writer. For this reason he exerted a pro¬ 
found influence in developing in America that interest in 
nature, and particularly birds, which has been so potent a 
factor in securing the passage and enforcement of laws 
protecting wild life in that country. 
Mr. Burroughs was the leader in the movement against 
what, in America, is called “nature faking,” and, joined by 
Mr. Roosevelt, he succeeded in bringing into disrepute that 
class of writers who, sacrificing truth for gain, presented 
fiction as fact and attributed to animals an intelligence they 
are far from possessing. 
Mr. Burroughs won disciples not only by the power of 
