The Zoologist/4th series, vol 5 (1901)/Issue 720/Notices of New Books
NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.
This is really a commentary on the history of British Birds; it is rather a notebook than a handbook; it expresses the author's mature opinion, and gives a reference to much of the information on which it is based; it is not apparently designed as an only book on the subject, but as an indispensable one among others. In classification Mr. Harting remains with the older writers, and commences with the Accipitres,—a matter needing little comment, as the book is outside the discussion of an evolutionary principle on that subject, and is devoted to the status of what may be considered really British Birds, and facts relating to their history.
Mr. Harting, as the late Editor of this Journal, is well acquainted with, and has largely quoted from its pages, most of the records having already passed through his hands. And here the difficulties of his authorship must have been accentuated. The responsibility of sifting such records, accepting some as beyond doubt, and rejecting others as of a more uncertain character, is considerable. The sceptre requires to be held with judicial tenacity, and kept from the grasp of caprice, whilst the sorrowful reflection cannot be avoided that some of the best observations are made by those who absolutely loathe publication, and whose knowledge thus remains of a purely personal character. The author has shown considerable indulgence in recording reports of British occurrences of the Great Black Woodpecker; these reports occupy three pages, and are subsequently said to be held by Prof. Newton, on the authority of Mr. J.H. Gurney's criticism in Dresser's 'Birds of Europe,' as almost worthless in nearly every instance.
There are many notes of an antiquarian character which give a particular interest to the volume; on entries found in the 'Durham Household Book,' 1530-34, Mr. Harting proposes to change the name of Dunlin to Dunling. The weights of many birds are also given, information not always easily procurable. Our own idea is to have this work interleaved and bound up in two volumes, and used not only as a reference book for British birds—which it undoubtedly is—but to make it an even greater storehouse by the addition of our gleanings and memoranda. A well annotated volume is always a compliment to the book itself. The coloured illustrations, reproduced from original drawings by the late Prof. Schlegel, represent the heads of two hundred and sixty-two species (male and female), and will no doubt prove a boon to many observers and incipient ornithologists.
It is a coincidence that two English classics—and yet how diverse!—appeared almost simultaneously: we allude to the 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,' and the 'Natural History of Selborne.' The writer of this interesting book has avoided the mention of this literary twinship. White was born in 1730, and died in 1793; Gibbon's birth took place in 1737, and his death in 1794. The 'Natural History of Selborne' was published in 1788, the same year as Gibbon's concluding volumes were given to the world. With the almost certainty that both books will last with the language, and that they have nothing in common, the parallel may be considered closed.
We have had so many editions of the work, that the life of its writer was almost a demand of letters. These two volumes lift much of the veil, and probably tell us all we shall ever know on the subject. We can see that Gilbert White was a genius in the sense of the not universally accepted definition, that that much-used word is the equivalent of the art of taking pains. He was an ardent naturalist—-born to that vocation—a man of thrift, an old-time clergyman of the Established Church, a courteous gentleman, and one who certainly did not excel in the gentle art of making enemies. Besides this, he ever studied the method of dignified composition, a circumstance, almost as much as its natural history, which has rendered his book a classic. This long placid life of continuous observation and industrious notation, passed in what has been irreverently called "single blessedness," and apparently without either romance or affliction, was a congenial atmosphere for the production of this little masterpiece. We have now and then a glimpse of the dull conformity of the inhabitants. "For more than a century past," White reports to his Bishop, "there does not appear to have been one Papist, or any Protestant Dissenter of any denomination." We also read, "Selborne is not able to maintain a schoolmaster," Our naturalist also abhorred the "dangerous doctrines of levellers and republicans"; he writes, "I was born and bred a gentleman, and hope I shall be allowed to die such"; while he explains to a correspondent, that "the reason you have so many bad neighbours is your nearness to a great factious manufacturing town." He was as lovable as a Vicar of Wakefield, but not so foolish; he seems to have been really outside politics; and we are told nothing as to his theological views. He was probably a model village priest, and a true friend to his parishioners.
This completes our purview of these two charming volumes, which must find a place with all Selbornian literature. They give us the life of the author of the book we have so often read. The portrait given as frontispiece is probably apocryphal, as we are distinctly told elsewhere that "no portrait or sketch of any kind was ever made of him."
Of all books of travel, those written by naturalists for the perusal of naturalists are perhaps the most charming. The cabinet ornithologist can in fancy see his dried skins as living birds, and experience the difference between these creatures in their native haunts, and their mummified remains in cabinet drawers. This book is a revised and amalgamated form of two previous publications by Mr. Seebohm, strangely entitled 'Siberia in Europe,' and 'Siberia in Asia,' both previously noticed at the time of their publication in these pages; and, like "Japhet in search of a Father," this most interesting volume is still in want of a consistent title, the 'Birds of Siberia' being, strictly, a misnomer.
A definite object was before these two expeditions—the first of which may be said to have owed its initiative to Mr. J.A. Harvie-Brown—and that object was the acquirement, if not even the discovery, of the eggs of the Grey Plover, the Little Stint, the Sanderling, the Curlew Sandpiper, the Knot, and Bewick's Swan. Of these the Knot was the only species unseen, and of the others, identified eggs were obtained and brought home of the Grey Plover, the Little Stint, and Bewick's Swan. But this has been pointed out before; the importance of the present publication is that it combines two volumes which had very much in common, and that it places a charming account of ornithological exploration in a revised and handsome form, and at a reasonable price, at the option of ornithologists, as well as of those who would read a vivid account of the immense contrasts which nature exhibits between her winter and summer solstices in those northern regions.
The first volume of this monograph has been already noticed (ante, p. 77); the second has now appeared, and concludes a section of an important faunistic publication. There are probably many more of the smaller mammals to be discovered in South Africa, but Mr. Sclater has now brought our knowledge up to date, and with these two volumes the naturalist should have little hesitation in the identification of his species. In fact, the scientific or technical description is completed so far as present collections are concerned; other species will be doubtless discovered and described; but the great, or natural history work still requires to be done, and that may well claim the attention of field naturalists for many years to come. We want now to know more of the life-histories and habits of these creatures; we are waiting for the narratives of the Gilbert Whites and Richard Jefferies of South Africa. When these men arise they will find their pursuits made very possible by the aid of these excellent volumes, which to the sportsman should prove a perfect vade mecum.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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