112 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [April, 



GENERIC TYPES OF NEARCTIC REPTILIA AND AMPHIBIA. 



BY ARTHUR ERWIN BROWN. 



By the adoption of the new Article 30 of the International Zoological 

 Code at the Boston meeting of the seventh Congress in August, 1907, 

 the methods of nomenclature are brought measurably nearer to 

 uniformity; perhaps as near as is possible under any set of rules, for 

 it must always be true of inelastic rules — and fortunate that it is so — 

 that they cannot excuse the individual from the exercise of independ- 

 ent judgment in cases such as those where diverging opinions may 

 fairly be held as to their application. Absolute agreement is not 

 likely to be reached until, in respect of the past, names themselves 

 are formally adopted by general accord, instead of rules. 



So completely representative a body as the International Zoological 

 Congress having unanimously adopted the new Article, the way is 

 made easy for the minority of zoologists who are dissenters as to some 

 of its provisions, for they may now be willing to yield their practice 

 to so great a preponderance of opinion in matters which are those onl}' 

 of convention. 



For this reason the Code is here followed in all essential details, even 

 to the acceptance of undefined genera, such as those of Fitzinger in 

 the System Reptilium, in place of others which in the author's own 

 opinion have a better claim to be preferred. But it is not now profit- 

 able to discuss the question. 



For most of the genera here included types have been ascertained 

 from time to time as necessity required, but the whole list has now 

 been re\dsed in accordance with the present rule. 



No full synonymy of the genera has been attempted, the names 

 cited as equivalents being only those that have been in recent use for 

 the whole or a part of the contents of the one adopted. 



REPTILIA. 



The name was first used by Laurenti (1768) for his three divisions, 

 (I) Salientia, (II) Gradientia, (III) Serpentes, and included all reptiles 

 and amphibians. The correct limits of the class were first laid down 

 by Gray (Annals of Philosophy, (2), 10, p. 194, 1825). 



