I 



Bibliographical Notices, 79 



are other authors besides Rafinesque, who will be remembered chiefly 

 by the spurious genera they have made. 



The genera of Humphrey, quoted in the foregoing list, appeared in 

 the " Museum Calonneanum," a Catalogue published anonymously in 

 the year 1797, and containing names only, without definitions. The 

 names attributed to Bolten are also supposed to be taken from a 

 Catalogue, but who has ever seen it ? We have found the name 

 "Gevers" placed as the authority for Meuschen's names in the 

 Mus. Geversianum, and " Berlin " for Link's names in the Berlin 

 Museum. But who wrote the "Museum Boltenianum " ? The 

 authors have not thought these things worth inquiring into, and we 

 quite agree with them so far. 



The Linnsean code, of which Herrmannsen gives an excellent digest, 

 and the Rules of the British Association require that names should 

 be really published, and accompanied by a description sufficient to 

 identify the object and justify the imposition of the new term. 



The last case we have to consider is that of names which have been 

 properly defined in the pages of rare and obscure publications, and 

 have remained unknown till discovered by chance after many years. 

 The great work of Pallas, destroyed by fire, and not reprinted for 

 half a century ; the MS. of De Blainville's * Malacologie,' mislaid by 

 Dr. Leach ; and Leach's own manuscript, unprinted till its value had 

 nearly departed, — are examples of the casualties which attend author- 

 ship. In Messrs. Adams's Genera, we find the authority of Link 

 cited for some names older than those of Lamarck ; and it appears 

 by a note of Herrmannsen' s that four parts of a little work were 

 printed in 1806-8, and afterwards burnt by their distinguished 

 author ; all that we know of them is derived from a solitary copy, 

 found accidentally by M. Morch, at Lund in Scania. Now, how- 

 ever much we may regret these circumstances, it may well be doubted 

 whether names in general use — names which have been employed in 

 many countries and in many books, and have become familiar as 

 household words — should be changed *'in justice to the memory " of 

 authors long since removed from these and all other vanities. 



It must not be supposed that the venerable nomenclature employed 

 by our authors has been obtained by a vast amount of research, 

 entitling them to throw ofp the fetters of the Lamarckian or any 

 other *' school." If they have not followed any of the great concho- 

 logists, they have borrowed their terminology from a very unpre- 

 tending source — the Sale-Catalogue of the Yoldi Collection, by a 

 young and enthusiastic native of Copenhagen, Otto Morch {angl. 

 Murk) — where we find all these names, prudently inclosed in 

 brackets, after those which would be intelligible to the shell-buying 

 world. 



We feel bound to say that we cannot believe these names will ever 

 come into general use ; the authors have thrown fresh impediments 

 in the path of the student, and have lost the opportunity of making 

 theirs the chief and standard work on conchological nomenclature. 



The classification adopted by Messrs. Adams will be most readily 

 seen by putting in a tabular form, and translating for the convenience 



