Benham. — Nomenclature of the Birds of New Zealand. 191 



it has been customary to call it, then by the law of priority that latter 

 name must give way to the earlier-bestowed name ; or, on the other hand, 

 if a name in general use for a given bird turns out on investigation to have 

 been given at an earlier date to a bird of quite a different character, then 

 some later name must be substituted for the former bird. This is well 

 illustrated by our woodhens (Maori hens, or wekas) : the generic name 

 Ocydromus, by which the birds have been hitherto known to us, is found 

 to be " untenable, being preoccupied " —that is, Iredale by an exhaus- 

 tive examination of the literature has discovered that at some previous 

 date this name had been used for quite another bird ; hence it becomes 

 ' untenable " for our woodhens, or, indeed, for any other animal whatso- 

 ever (" Novitates Zoologicae," vol. 18. 1911, p. 22). The name next later in 

 date to this is found to be Gallirallus, which had fallen into oblivion, and 

 now has to be revived. The authors go fully into the difficulties of deter- 

 mining the exact names of the species of our woodhens. The result of their 

 analysis is that "Gallirallus australis ranges throughout the North, South, 

 and Stewart Islands, but in slightly differentiated subspecific forms." 



The stitch-bird is no longer Pogonornis ; that name is preoccupied. 

 as appears to have been noted by Eichmond in 1908. and is replaced by 

 Notiomystis. 



I do not know on what grounds Notornis is regarded as incorrect for 

 the species hochstetteri. According to the International Committee, the 

 name is to be retained for the extinct form, Notornis mantslli, and though 

 Meyer long ago showed that the living species of the South Island is worthy 

 of distinct specific recognition no such important differences were men- 

 tioned as to indicate that there is a generic difference between the two. 

 But according to our authors " No^mis" must disappear, and be replaced 

 by a new name, " Mantellomis." They say, "Mathews has gone fully into 

 the matter of the generic and specific names of this bird " (as he has of 

 other birds) in his work " Birds of Australia," 1911, 1912 ; and in this 

 "■ Reference List " these reasons are not given in full, or only in a few 

 instances. As the " Birds of Australia " is not accessible to me, it is 

 impossible for me to give Mathews's reasons for this particular change. 



The little rifleman (Acanthisitta chloris) receives as much as two pages 

 and a half of discussion on its generic and specific names ; and amidst much 

 confusion the fact is brought out that Sparrman gave as the locality " Cape 

 of Good Hope " to the specimens collected by Forster at Dusky Sound. 

 Fortunately, he did not add to the confusion by using a specific name that 

 would perpetuate this error. 



In most instances, however, the matter, 'having been treated previously 

 either by Mathews or by Iredale in earlier papers, is not dealt with in detail 

 in this article. 



It will be seen from the lists appended (pp. 194-202) that in several 

 instances a single genus has been broken up into two or more genera : thus 

 some of the species which have been attributed to the genus Oestrelata are 

 now placed in the genus Pterodroma, others in Cookilaria, both of which 

 were founded as long ago as 1856, but which seem to have been overlooked 

 by our naturalists in New Zealand. 



The genus Phalacrocorax is broken up into five genera, one of which must 

 retain Linne's name ; three others have been established for something 

 like fifty years, and one is formed now by the authors. 



The genus Prion is found to be " indeterminable " — it is insufficiently 

 characterized by its author, Lacepede ; and some of the species formerly 



