Excerpt from History of British Birds, Vol. 3 of 4 It is not within my province to consider the advisability of publishing under the honoured name of Yarrell a work which must necessarily be, to a great extent, rewritten but my portion of the task, once accepted, has been performed to the best of my ability. Where practicable, the original phraseology has been followed, with due modifications; the opening words of the sentences have frequently been pre served, as 'landmarks' for possessors of former Editions; and extracts from the authors and correspondents quoted by Yarrell have been retained, subject to considerations of space, relevancy, and accuracy. This work of selection and adapta tion has entailed severe labour, and, as a matter of fact, the original articles on the species added to the British list since the publication of the Third Edition, are those which have given the least trouble. 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.