74 INTRODUCTION. 
books, and from intercourse with a numerous and well- 
informed body of naturalists, are now nearly as great 
in this country as in Europe. 
There are, however, other causes tending to the 
continual introduction of spurious species, independent 
of the selection of a secondary class of characters 
on which to establish them, and these arise from the 
usages of the science itself, and from opinions which 
are held by some of its authors. We shall briefly 
mention two of them. The custom of appending the 
name of the earliest describer of a species to that of 
the species itself, although it is, in the present state of 
zoology, necessary and proper, has in this comiection 
inconvenient results. It is certainly a standing evidence 
of progress, but the working zoologist is apt to attach 
too much importance to it, and to imagine that his 
own diligence, and perhaps his scientific reputation, 
are measured by the number of species which he dis- 
covers and describes. At the present time, when 
every subject of science is attracting the attention of 
many minds, and the competition is particularly active 
in zoology, he is justified in supposing that delay may 
deprive him of the priority of his discovery. Influ- 
enced at once by a praiseworthy desire of establishing 
his own claims, and by the fear of being anticipated, 
he hastens to bring forward his description, often with- 
out giving himself sufficient time to verify the certainty 
of his discovery. The result in such a case is fre- 
quently a supposititious species. The proper correction 
