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Show 1896.] RULES OE ZOOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE. 313 (Canon X.), enacts that the name of the author, if given, should follow the scientific name without any intervening sign. The prevailing practice in this country has been to place a c o m m a after the specific name and before the authority. But on this subject, I must say, I think that the German Code has good reason on its side. "When, for example, w e write Turdus viscivorus, Linn., w e mean in fact Turdus viscivorus Linncn-that is, the Turdus viscivorus of Linnaeus, Linnaei being in the genitive case after the nominative Turdus viscivorus. If this view, which, no doubt, is the correct one, is taken, it is obvious that no comma is required between the nominative and the genitive which follows it. The adoption of this reform would save a great many thousand commas in our zoological works. W h e n the author's name refers only to the specific and not to the generic term, both English and German Codes agree that the author's name should be enclosed in parentheses. I must remind you, however, that the invariable addition of an author's name to a scientific name is a modern practice, and in many cases wholly unnecessary. It converts a binary system into a trinary one. In familiar names, such as Turdus viscivorus, for example, it is obviously quite unnecessary to add any authority to such a well-known term. (2) Another point on which I a m glad to be able to agree with the German Code is that (see Canon V.) it permits orthographical corrections "when the word is, without doubt, wrongly written or incorrectly transcribed." The American rule upon this subject (Canon X X X I . ) , and still more the American practice, is, in m y opinion, simply perverse. The rule enacts that " neither generic nor specific names are to be rejected for faulty construction, inapplicability of meaning, or erroneous signification." They therefore contemplate, and not only contemplate but insist upon, the surrender of the plainest rules of grammar to the principle of priority. W e have only to turn over the pages of the ' Check-list' to find abundant illustrations of this deformity. (Estrelata is written JEstrelaia, although it is probable that Bonaparte, w ho was a good classical scholar, only spelt it this way by a slip of bis pen : Aithyia is spelt Aythya, although w e know, from its obvious Greek equivalent, that this is wrong: Heniconetta is used without the H, although the Greek word from which it is derived, carried an initial aspirate : Pedicecetes is written Pediocaetes, as originally misspelt by Baird, although there can be no doubt that he meant by it an inhabitant (ot/fijn/s) of the plain (nediov). W e wdll not multiply examples of these errors, but need only remark that no one with a pretence to a classical education is likely to submit to the causeless infliction of such barbarisms. The German Code is quite on our side in this instance and not only permits such corrections but gives excellent examples (see explanation to Sect. V.) of the proper way in which they should be carried out. Whether corrections of obvious misstatements of fact, and the consequent rejection of certain names, should be allowed is another question. To m e it seems absurd to call an American bird Bucco |