352 
Obituary. 
Oporto. According to Mr. Wm. Tait, the Crossbill is a rare 
and occasional visitor in Portugal, merely appearing at 
irregular intervals. He informs me that a few individuals 
were observed in a garden near Oporto in November last, 
and that a friend of his at Coimbra University, between 
Oporto and Lisbon, had informed him that a large number 
of Crossbills arrived there in October, some of the birds 
being still in the neighbourhood at the time of his writing. 
Unfortunately no specimens had been secured, and on 
Mr. Tait writing to endeavour to obtain some, it was too 
late, for the birds had all disappeared. This is to be 
regretted, as it would have been interesting to have been able 
to establish the identity of these birds, and to know whether 
they formed part of the great invasion from North Europe, 
or whether they belonged to the local Spanish form, which 
is perhaps also resident in some parts of Portugal. 
XV.— Obituary. 
Dr. B. Bowdler Sharpe. 
Bichard Bowdler Sharpe died at Chiswick on the 25th of 
December, 1909, at the age of sixtv-two. To the general 
public he was best known as the head of the Bird Depart¬ 
ment of the Natural History Museum at South Kensington, 
though, strictly speaking, this was not the official designa¬ 
tion of the post which he so long occupied. To students 
and fellow workers throughout the world he was much more 
than this ; for his profession was his hobby, and he worked at 
it with such unremitting energy and devotion as to distance 
all competitors in the amount and quality of the scientific 
work which he achieved. In his study of the vast collections 
under his charge he acquired an unrivalled knowledge of the 
bird-life of the world, estimated to include more than 18,000 
species, almost any one of which he could name at sight, except 
in the case of closely allied forms, which would necessitate 
comparison with others. Further than this, he could tell 
