Birds of Britain

Birds of Britain is by J. Lewis Bonhote, who is named as a member of the British Ornithologists’ Union. The title page says the book has 100 illustrations in colour selected by H. E. Dresser from his Birds of Europe. The preface says the study of Nature has of late years enormously increased, and that there is probably no branch of its varied and inexhaustible interests which appeals more strongly to young and old than the fascinating study of Birds.

A bird account says summer is nearly with us before the last Fieldfares have left our shores, as not uncommonly they may be seen until the middle of May. The entry on The Egyptian Vulture, Neophron percnopterus, calls it another South European species of which two examples have been obtained, one in Somersetshire and one in Essex. The entry on The Marsh Harrier, Circus æruginosus, says that formerly this species used to breed regularly in many places in England, where large stretches of marsh-land suitable to its habits were to be found.