78 INTRODUCTION. 



impropriety in this usage ; for the naturahst who had 

 labored for years in elucidating the history of a particu- 

 lar class of animals, without any other reward than 

 that arising from the gratification which the pursuit 

 itself furnished, might well deserve to have his name 

 connected with that department of knowledge which 

 he had promoted. Indeed, there was acknowledged 

 to be a beautiful propriety in distinguishing a genus 

 of plants by the name of Lmnteus, the great reformer 

 of botany, or a species of birds by that of Wilson, 

 their eloquent and graceful historian ; and in other 

 similar examples. Names derived from persons even 

 of much less celebrity as naturalists might not be pro- 

 ductive of any practical inconvenience, and the custom 

 was therefore so far sanctioned as to be admitted as an 

 occasional exception to a general rule.* It was, how- 

 ever, a great error to permit any departure from the 

 original rule, and its infraction has been followed by 

 consequences very much to be regretted. In our 

 own country, where there is but little of that con- 

 servative feehng which tends to the preservation of 

 those usages and principles which past experience has 

 proved to be wise and useful, and where innovations 

 of all kinds are entered upon rashly, and often, as it 

 would seem, from a mere love of change, and where 

 the influence of the personal example of the most 



' The exception is thus stated by Mr. Swainson, in his System of No- 

 menclature : " Species may be occasionally named after persons, provided 

 they have been distinguished in that branch of zoology." 



