4 TN CTCRODUCT I ON.

the Caspian. This work on Eastern Persia also contains an account of the collections made by

Sir Oliver St. John during his residence near Shiraz. When we come to Afghanistan we have the

g
excellent observations of Captain Hutton on the Birds of Kandahar, published in 1840 and 1846, and
the more scattered notices of the collections made by Dr. Samuel Griffith in the same country, as
:
recorded by Messrs. Horsfield and Moore in their ‘Catalogue of the Birds in the Museum of the East
India Company.’ Besides these there are some excellent papers by Colonel Swinhoe, Captain Wardlaw
Ramsay, and Serjeant Barnes, giving an account of the birds observed by them during the last
Afghan war.

As regards British India, we have already alluded to the state of its ornithological record up to
the year 1850, when the labours of Blyth and Jerdon had done so much to prepare the way for
the successful issue which has since uninterruptedly followed. Ceylon appears to have been the next
place to be explored by working ornithologists; and Mr. KE. L. Layard contributed in 1853
some very interesting notes on the birds of that country, supplementary to the catalogue published
by Dr. Kelaart in his ‘ Prodromus Faun Zeylonice.’ But in the year 1854 a most important work on
Indian ornithology was issued, which we consider to have had a great effect upon the recent studies
of ornithologists. This was the ‘Catalogue of the Birds in the Museum of the East India Company,’
a work which bears on its title-page the names of Dr. Horsfield and Mr. F. Moore, but which
is known to have been prepared entirely by the last-named naturalist. The importance of this
Catalogue consists in the fact that it gathers together into one compass all the scattered literature
of Indian birds which existed up to that period, and is especially valuable as containing a connected list
of references to Mr. Blyth’s papers spread over many volumes of the Asiatic Society’s ‘Journal.’ It must
therefore never be forgotten that in that year ornithologists possessed for the first time a nearly complete
literature of Indian birds, as far as the Accipitres, Passeres, and Picariz are concerned. A lull then
appears to have taken place in Indian ornithology, broken only by occasional papers from Mr. Blyth,
Colonel Tickell, and other field-naturalists, until the year 1862, when Dr. Jerdon brought out the
first volume of his ‘Birds of India. This book, which was published in three octavo volumes, was
completed in 1864; and, equally by naturalists at home as by field-ornithologists in India, it has been
recognized as the standard work on Indian ornithology. Many years must elapse before its utility
will be impaired; and it is certain that every one writing on the birds of India has to take

Jerdon’s book as his starting-point. Mr. Blyth’s able critique on this book in ‘The Ibis’ added