June, 1904.] DVAR AND CaUDELL : TyPES OF GeNERA. 121 



ficiently defined by the citation of one or more described species. 

 Since no generic description is ever absolutely complete and the ma- 

 jority are utterly useless to the monographer it is an arbitrary act to 

 require any verbal description. A species, of course, stands on a 

 different basis. Rothschild and Jordan's other rule that a genus is a 

 synonym of an earlier one if it contains the type of the latter is like- 

 wise unnecessary. If both are founded on the same type species they 

 are of course synonymous ; but if they have different types, both may 

 well be recognized, even though proposed to contain the same original 

 species. In this we agree with the American Ornithologists Union's 

 code.* The following is our proposed method : 



We accept the American Ornithologists Union's code with the fol- 

 lowing exceptions. Canons XXI, XXIII, XXIV, X XXVI and XLV are 

 rejected. Canon IV is acceptable except that we would fix the endings 

 also for tribes and superfamilies ; canon V, except that the name is to be 

 taken from the oldest included genus; canon VIII, except that the agree- 

 ment with the supposed gender of the genus is not necessary ; canon 

 IX, except that varietal names are retained ; canons XVII and XVIII, 

 except that we recognize absolute priority ; canon XXXVII, except 

 that a generic name must be based only on a species previously or con- 

 temporaneously defined ; canon XL, except that typographical errors 

 are accepted unless they introduce into a name characters not in the 

 Latin alphabet. In such cases we would amend so far as to substitute 

 the Latin equivalent, if there is one. If there is none, the name must 

 be rejected. 



In another form our ideas may be thus expressed : 



1. Generic and specific names are to be written as originally pro- 

 posed without emendation unless they contain characters not in the 

 Latin alphabet or are not binomial. 



Letters of the Latin alphabet are to be substituted for foreign characters if there 

 is an equivalent. W is the only English letter not found in Latin. 



2. Generic names are considered to be founded on one species 

 only. When the type species is not designated by the original author 

 the first species is to be regarded as the type. 



Species marked definitely by the author as unknown to him should not be taken 

 as types. The figuring of a species is a virtual designation of type. 



*The following papers may profitably be consulted on this subject: Kirby, 

 Proc. Ent. Soc. Lond., 1868, p. xlii ; Cook, Science, N. S., xv, 646, 1902; Roths- 

 child & Jordan, Nov. ZooL, ix, Suppl., 1903. 



