Page:Condor17(2).djvu/43

 Mar., 1915 PUBLICATIONS REVIEWED 105 requested to send their names and addresses to the Biological Survey, Washington, D.C. Full directions for making the census and bIank forms 'for the report will be for- warded in time to permit well considered plans to be formulated before the time for actual field work. As the Bureau has no funds available for the purpose, it must depend on the services of voluntary observ- ers. Very truly yours, E. W. NELSON, Assistant Chief, Biological Survey. Washington, D.C., February 16, 1915. PUBLICATIONS REVIEWED HANDBOOK OF BIRDS ] OF TI-IE [ WESTERN UNITED STATES I including the Great Plains, Great Basin, Pacific Slope, and I Lower Rio Grande Valley [ by I FLORENCE MERRIAM BAILEY [ with thirty-three full-page plates by ] Louis Agassiz Fuertes, and over six I hundred cuts in the text I Fourth edition, revised ] [design] I Boston and New York [ Houghton, Mifflin Company ] The Riverside Pt. ess Cambridge [ 1914. Pp. li+570, pls. I--XXXVI, 2 diagrams and 601 figs. in text. (Our copy received December 12, 1914.) The appearance of the fourth edition, re- vised, of Mrs. Bailey's Handbook is a suf- ficient attest to its popularity and useful- ness. To the average student of birds in the western United States this is the only satisfactory handbook available, and teach- ers in schools and colleges give it wide use in the classroom and laboratory. Revision in the present edition consists in the elimination of all the local lists (pages xliii--lxxxii of the original edition, 40 in all) of the original text, the succeeding parts of the introduction being brought forward and repaged to fill the gap, and in the addition of fifty-nine pages (485--544) of new mate- rial. This new matter covers the following subjects: "Changes in nomenclature made by the nomenclature committee of the Am- erican Ornithologists' Union, 1902-1913" (2 pages), "Species to be added" (31 pages, with a brief description of each added form), "Species to be eliminated" (1 page), "Birds of the western United States in the nomenclature of the 1910 check-list" (451 pages, giving the A. O. U. number, the sci- entific and vernacular names and the range condensed by the extensive use of abbrevi- ations), and "Books of reference" (62/3 pages, supplemental to the original list printed on pp. xliv-xltx of the amended in- troduction). Thus from the standpoint of nomenclature and distribution the revised edition reflects much more of our present knowledge, while the technical descriptions and the miscellaneous notes by. Mr. and Mrs. Bailey and others remain unchanged. In view of the extensive popular use of the book it is to be regretted that the pub- lishers could not concede to Mrs. Bailey a complete revision of the book, such as she desired. Certain shortcomings, which could not be foreseen when the work was first published, make parts of the original text difficult for the average student to use. However, a thorough revision is to be ex- pected within the next few years, and until then the present edition, as with previous ones, will very effectively fill the need for authoritative information concerning bird life in western North ,Amertca.--TRxc I. STORER. ALASKAN BIRD-LIFE  as I Depicted by Many Writers I Edited by{ ERNEST INGER- SOLI, [ -- ] Seven Plates in Colors and Other Illustrations. [ -- ] Published by the ! Na- tional Association of Audubon Societies [ New York, 1914 [our copy received Novem- ber 27, 1914]; 72 pp., 7 col. pls., 5 hfft., 1 map. (To be purchased for $1.00 at the Office of the Audubon Societies, New York City.) A splendid idea has here been pug into execution--that of making available throughout the schools of a given district a pdpular account of its birds. No less than 8000 copies of this little book are to be dis- tributed to the school children of Alaska. This benefaction, as e are told in Febru- dry, 1915, number of Bird-Lore, is made pos- sible through private gift for the purpose. The text consists chiefly of quotations and direct contributions from several lead- ing students of Alaskan bird-life, and inso- far as these contributed accounts are ren- dered verbatim, no criticism can be offered. By far the more important of these con- tributions come from the pen of our fore- most Alaskan authority, E. W. Nelson. His new writings here published are no less virile than those of his Alaskan "Report" of thirty years ago. The colored plates, chiefly by Brooks, are further features of great merit. Let it be understood that, even with the unfavorable comments to follow, the object and, in the main, the execution of this booklet deserve the warmest com- mendation. It is all the more a pity that a high standard could not have been secured on all of its pages. Although we are told in the Introduction that "the greatest care has been taken as to accuracy", no less than thirty more or less serious mistakes offend the eye of the reader on the first twenty-five pages. It is only fair to the various contributors to state that these twenty-five pages of matter are chiefly the compilation of the editor of "Alaskan Bird-Life", who thus shows scien- tific unfitness for the service rendered. As illustrative of the kinds of errors in evidence, we may point out the following (italics ours): "Among those [of the auk family] breeding in crowded colonies south o! the Aleutian islands are the ... crested auklets, marbled, ancient, and Kittlitz's murrelets .... and the black guillemots"--