Excerpt from A Concise Handbook of British Birds Although the urgent need for compression has prohibited the author from presenting this work as a complete natural history of British Birds, yet he believes that as a handy textbook for reference it has had as yet no rivals. It has been brought up to date as far as possible, every species on the British list having been included, and nearly all described, while the records Of the rarer species have been carefully collected, and in the case Of the common species a tolerably complete life-history has been given. The numbering Of the genera and species will also probably prove Of service. The length Of a bird is (unless otherwise stated) measured from the base Of bill to tip Of tail, all measure ments being in inches and hundredth-parts. The description first given is (unless expressly mentioned) that Of a bird in breeding plumage, 'but the seasonal changes, if appreciable, are added. The habitat may be taken as meaning the region inhabited during the breeding season, but the winter range Of migratory species has usually been added. If brackets enclose a describer's name they indicate that the generic name adopted is not that used by the describer. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.