70 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



that, as long as an accepted term employed in other sciences or arts 

 expresses precisely the conditions or ideas to be expressed, there is no 

 gain in coining a new word. 



(b) Words which are current with well-established meanings should 

 not be employed as terms in another sense, especially where it is likely 

 that ambiguity would be introduced by the simultaneous use of the 

 ordinary sense and the term meaning. 



(c) Age is a virtue: a long-established, sufficiently well-defined and 

 understood term should not be lightly discarded or supplanted unless 

 very considerable improvement were gained. Convenience, we repeat, 

 is the object of language, and it is more convenient to use established 

 language than to fish for new words. 



{d) Terms shoiild be as short and as nearly as possible self-explana- 

 tory. It is, of course, well nigh impossible, nor is it necessary, that a 

 term explain all that is implied in it ; it is the very impossibility of doing 

 so that leads to the use of special terms which to the initiated at once 

 convey the full explanation. But, if the term suggests its own explana- 

 tion, it will be the more acceptable. 



(e) Finally, the word or word combination should have a term 

 quality. This is, perhaps, the most difficult requirement to define or to 

 discover: it is like taste in art, it requires a language sense which by 

 instinct or intuitively rejects the unsuitable. A word infrequently used 

 in common language has thereby more term quality than one in common 

 use ; a Roman word more than a Saxon ; a brief combination more than a 

 long one ; a compound more than a phrase ; an unusual compound more 

 than a common one. 



Often commonplace language assumes a somewhat specialized mean- 

 ing and has then been included in this list of terms. Occasionally even 

 without this specialized meaning words have been admitted because 

 their common sense is not quite clear. Whether to admit or exclude 

 these has sometimes been a matter of controversy. The committee 

 has, perhaps, erred more in omitting than in admitting such terms. 



To those who find difficulty in accepting the committee's rulings, 

 there are three ways open : to continue the use of their own terms until 

 they find out their error; to use the synonymy, if it satisfies their taste 

 better; to come forward with arguments for their own choice of other 

 terms or of new terms, and in that way aid in the final acceptance and 

 growth of the terminology. 



For that end the committee is inclined to recommend the appoint- 

 ment of a standing committee on terminology. 

 For the committee, 



B. E. Fernow, 

 Toronto, Canada, December 26, 1916. Chairman 



