PREFACE.
It is an old remark that every book has many authors; it is one that is exceedingly applicable to 'The Zoologist,' and we congratulate our contributors on the volume they have produced for 1897.
Our pages in the record of observations may be said to exhibit the essence of co-operation, for our contributors do not only write about animals, but absolutely seem to live and work with them. This is the aim and ideal of 'The Zoologist.' We do not propose to merely interpret, but really to reveal the secrets and the polity of the animal life that is around us.
The present volume contains much of great interest in British Ornithology. We have recorded the undoubted occurrence of Hypolais polyglotta in Sussex; articles have appeared on the capture of Pallas's Willow Warbler, Phylloscopus proregulus, in Norfolk towards the end of last year, while from Cambridgeshire was announced the acquisition of an Albatross, Diomedea melanophrys, and a recent communication shows that little doubt can be entertained that a specimen of the Mediterranean Herring Gull, Larus cachinnans, was shot in Norfolk in 1886. Ornithology has again held the place in our Magazine which it has so long done, and 'The Zoologist' appears to be still considered the recognised and suitable vehicle for avian observations.
The Order Pisces has received increased attention, and in British Zoology the very fact of our sea-girt realm should give
