IT gives us unusual pleasure to announce a plan, the fulfilment of which, already assured, will, we believe, be of great assistance to bird students and exert an important influence on the increase in our knowledge of North American birds.
Realizing from a most fortunate experience how greatly the past-master in ornithology may aid the beginner, we have felt that it would be an admirable scheme to form an 'Advisory Council,' composed of leading ornithologists throughout the United States and Canada, who would consent to assist students by responding to their requests for information or advice, the student being thus brought into direct communication with an authority on the birds of his own region.
The response to our appeal has been most gratifying. Without exception the ornithologists whom we have addressed have cordially endorsed the proposed plan, and signified their willingness to coöperate with us in this effort to reach the isolated worker. Nearly every state in the Union and province in Canada has been heard from, and we expect in our next number to publish the names and addresses of the more than fifty prominent ornithologists who will form Bird-Lore's 'Advisory Council.'—Ed.
CAROLINE G. SOULE
IN the first number of Bird-Lore the author of 'Bird Studies for Children' says: "Most bird stories will interest them [children], especially if the birds are humanized for them by the teller of the tale." Humanizing, in this connection, means endowing with human characteristics, and is a process much in vogue just now among writers of nature-study books and papers for the use of children and teachers. Let us see if it is worth doing—or even is justifiable.