202
of what Mrs, Wright has tvell called this literature of the " Long How“ (‘The Critic.’ April, 1903),
Unfortunately, members of this school take themselves seriously and evidently believe that their crude observations and absurd deductions are as worthy of consideration as those of the trained naturalist and animal psychologist. Experience shows that we cannot look to tlte publishers {or protection from the growing flood of books of this kind. and we can only hope that. in time. the interested public will have acqu red enough first-hand information from personal obser- i-ariun to detect and reject these unnatural histories of animal life.
As a more tangible evidence of careless- ness on the part of the publishers of the present volume, we would call their atten- tion to the {act that tlte " Pigeon Hawk " facing page 68 is a Sharp-shinncd Hawk: that the “Belted Kingfisher" on page 109 is not that species, but apparently the Euro— pean bird: that a cut of Fulim is tnade to illustrate text relating to ()r'ilemm; that the "Chickadee" on page r73 isthe Moun- tain Chickadee. a species of the western United States, and that the Blue-winged \Varbler on page 2” should have no place in the hook at all.~F. Mi (3,
Bums or Lu H AND THE liEvaRn ls— Lrtxns, Hnu'nnrw Gttot By WALTER K. FISHER. Pages 1-39, plates i-x of the U. 8. Fish Commission Bulletin for [903.
It is a long time since BIRD-LURE has received a interesting than this record of Mr. Fisher's studies on Laysan and the neighboring islands, which he visited on the U. S. Fish Com- ntis ion May
more publication
steamer Albatross between and August, t902. Thoroughly prepared to make the most or the unusual opportttniti altordert a naturalist in these densely inhabited i)ll'(l
island. Mr. Fisher evidently usetl his eyes,
pen. and camera to the best advantage, and gives us a series ul exceptionally valuable observations and photographs Although his time on L an was limited. hittls were found to be so abundant antl so tame that
, no tlitht‘ulty was experienced in securing a
Bird- Lore
set of p
tnres admirably illustrating gen- eral conditions of the island bird~life and characteristic ha s of its birds. Incidentally it is stated that the widely published photograph showing car-loads of eggs of the Laysan Albatross was made to order by a photographer who gathered the eggs for the purpose of taking "a spectac- nlar picture"; an explanation which allay: our fears for the present safety of Laysan birds. and explodes more or less indefinite stories concerning the "dried albumen," etc.. for which I was said these eggs were shipped in vast quantities to Honolulu! So easy is it, in the lack of exact informa- tion, for false ideas to take root and flourish, Space forbids quotation from this valu- able contributiun to the study of island bird- liie. but we can commend it to our readers as an unusually interesting recountal of a natnralist's experience in one of the most re— markable of known bird islands—F. M. C.
The Ornithological Magazines
THE AUK.~'I‘he October ‘Auk’ opens with one of William Brewster‘s pleasant sketches, this time recording the discovery of a nest of the Philadelphia Vireo. Hith— erto only one nest and no authentic eggs have been preserved. and, as Mr. Brewster was the first, years ago, to make known the life-history of this rare little bird, it is pe- culiarly appropriate that the discovery of a nest should finally {all to his lot. A half» tone of the nest and eggs is shown, ‘A Con- trihntion to the Life<History of the Herring Gull ** *' by William Butcher and W. B. Baily, who visited a large colony on the Maine coast, proves that even a common species still affords opportunities for discov~ cries of habits and traits in its home-life. The accompanying halfetones are well chosenr
Robert E. Snodgrass is following a com- parativer unbeaten path in ‘Notes on the Anatomy of orarprza. Camrnir and En» I/Ir'iiin,‘ hirtls of the Galapagos IslandsI his paper being Illustrated by original drawings. A harvest awaits the reaper in the field of avian anatomy. The birds of another mid» ocean island, Laysan, were found at home and ridiculously tame by W, K. Fisher,
