  We present observations of 82 Local Group dwarf galaxy candidates, of which
62 were chosen visually from ESO-SRC survey plates of the southern sky (32 of
which were not previously catalogued) and the rest suggested by various sources
in the literature. Two are the Local Group galaxies Antlia and Cetus; nine are
more distant galaxies, though still within a few megaparsecs; 45 are background
galaxies; seven are planetary (or other emission) nebulae; 15 are reflection or
other Galactic nebulae; two are galaxy clusters; one is a Galactic star cluster
and one is a misidentified star. We conclude that there is no large population
of faint Local Group dwarf galaxies of any familiar type awaiting discovery. We
point out the danger of relying on a single type of data to reach conclusions
about an object.
