218 Letters, Exti acts, and Notes. 



familiar and an unfamiliar bird cannot be defined, and what 

 is coirect in one case must be right in the other. 



However, about the necessity of correcting erroneous 

 names commonly used For birds one might differ, and, 

 knowing the views of the reviewer in 'The Ibis/ I should 

 not have taken the pains to write this letter. But the reviewer 

 makes erroneous statements and is therefore apt to mislead 

 those readers who are not in a position to investigate such 

 nomenclatorial questions themselves. The reviewer says 

 that the identification of Boddaert's Motacilla borin is un- 

 certain, and that the Motacilla hortensis of Graelin "has 

 been generally supposed to he the Garden-Warbler." These 

 statements are wrong, The case is as follows : — 



Motacilla hortensis Gmelin, Syst. Xat. i. 1, p. 955 (178!)), 

 is taken from Brisson's and Buffon's description and 

 Daubenton's plate. The description of these authors an 1 

 the plate of Daubentou shew unmistakably the Orphean 

 Warbler; even Gmeliu's abridged diagnosis leaves no doubt 

 about this, especially his description of the tail with the 

 outer webs of the lateral rectrices white, a character peculiar 

 to the Orphean Warbler but not found in the Garden- 

 Warbler. The habitat given by Gmelin is France and 

 Italy! Latham and other ornithologists understood this 

 very well, and Latham therefore called the English variety 

 of the bird described by Buffon and Brisson (/'. e. the Garden- 

 Warbler) Sylvia .simplex. Unfortunately, however, there is 

 an older name for the Garden-Warbler, namely Motacilla 

 borin, of Boddaert. This name was given to the "Petite 

 Fauvette" of Buffon and Brisson figured on the plate of 

 Laubenton (PL Enl. 579), and referring undoubtedly to the 

 " Garden-Warbler " as distinguished from the " Fauvette," 

 i. e. the Orphean Warbler. Moreover, it has not generally 

 been supposed that Gmeliu's Motacilla hortensis is the 

 Garden-Warbler. Seebohm (cf. Cat. B. Brit. Mus. v. pp. 1 1 

 and xiii) was very well aware of the facts, but he and 

 other ornithologists took quite a singular and high-handed 

 action in calling the Garden-Warbler " Sylvia hortensis 

 Bechstein '' instead of l< Sylvia hortensis Gmelin," thus 



