NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA. 341 



practical availability, however, for nomenclatural purposes, is 

 another question, to be decided mainly upon our interpretation of 

 his summary of 215 birds as "a mere list of names," or as a bond 

 fide descriptive catalogue. 



What is a description ? It is any intelligibly indicative phrase. 

 It may be extended to a treatise, or be comprised in a single word. 

 Diagnosis is condensed description, to exclusion of non-essential 

 particulars. Length of terms is obviously no criterion. Defini- 

 tion, diagnosis, description, are practically convertible terms. No 

 one can fail to perceive that Bartram has treated every one of his 

 species with description, diagnosis, or definition, and left no doubt 

 of his meaning in the majority of cases. Even in the cases of his 

 shortest definitions, it is only by shutting our eyes, with a tight 

 squeeze too, that we can fail to perceive that names such as 

 Bartram uses, are, like names in general, originally, the essence 

 of description. And in any event the " mere name" theory can 

 only be urged as an objection to a part of Bartram's species, some 

 of them being described at length, to the letter as well as in the 

 spirit of the law. No one can claim that, e. g., Bartram's nos. 105, 

 or 274, or 181 , are not " described," or that they are precluded from 

 recognition, because they occur in an article where some other 

 species may not be described. Nor is there any essential differ- 

 ence between the mode of treatment of these species, and of no. 93 

 for instance, where Bartram says " Fringilla fusca, the large 

 brown white throat sparrow." Nor, to take an extreme case, as 

 no. 100, has any one any doubt what Bartram meant in saying 

 " Sturnus stercorarius, the cowpen bird ?" 



For those who cling to the "mere name" theory, there is an 

 argument in reserve. As Dr. Sclater has well observed, in treating 

 of zoogeographical areas, the distribution of a species is as much 

 one of its attributes, as any matter of form, size, or other physical 

 property. Description, of course, may be based upon any quality 

 that pertains to the object. Now Bartram prefaces his list with 

 a set of formularized descriptions of geographical distribution, 

 migration, or nidification, which he has caused to apply severally 

 and individually to every one of his species, 1 by the use of certain 

 perfectly well understood typography. The fact, therefore, is 



1 Excepting no. 161, where no asterisk appears, by evident oversight or 

 typographical error. 



