27ie Scottish Naturalist. 107* 



inverted letter (which, in such a position, is not the symbol of 

 any articulate sound) be retained, in the second we must retain 

 the mis-spelling, for ''it matters not in the least by what con- 

 ventional' sound we agree to designate an individual object, 

 provided the sign to be employed be stamped with such an 

 authority as will suffice to make it pass current." 



A great deal has been written for and against a literal inter- 

 pretation of rule (4). I agree with those who hold to a literal 

 interpretation, and for this reason, that if all naturalists of this 

 day were to agree to use only those names which are in use 

 though not having priority, it by no means follows that their 

 successors will bind themselves to follow such an interpretation, 

 but if they adopt the oldest names given under the binomial 

 system, then the matter is settled for ever. " All that we can 

 with any justice demand is, that the original name by which a 

 species was first baptized should be recognised to the exclusion 

 of all others ; if it be possible to determine the name with accuracy" 

 (Agassiz). " The -changes necessitated by an application of the 

 law of priority to the names of species are comparatively small, 

 but appear more extensive than they really are because they 

 necessarily occur most frequently among common species." 

 (W. F. Kirby). 



Various dates (1766, 1758, &c.,) have been proposed as the 

 period farther back than which the law of priority should not 

 be carried. Linne fully and distinctly propounded the binomial 

 system in the Philosophia Botanica in 1751 (though he did not 

 apply it universally till 1758), and there can be no reason whatever 

 (as Dr. Thorell remarks) why authors who adopted and system- 

 atically applied it should be set aside. 



In regard to rule (6), botanists generally, and zoologists in 

 some countries, do not adhere 'to the principle that the name 

 placed after the name of a species should be the name of the 

 describer of the species, for in those cases where new genera 

 are established for the reception of previously described species, 

 or where -a species is removed from one genus to another, the 

 name of the founder of the new genus, or of the remover of the 

 species, supplants that of the original describer cf the species. 

 Against this practice several reasons may be brought forward, 

 tst, — That "it is an inducement for vain-glorious individuals to 

 found new genera without sufficient reason, in order that their 



