io6 



It is possible, however, that I may be told that in admitting 

 any exception whatever I am opening the door to every kind of 

 personal idiosyncrasy. On the contrary, this is the door which 

 of all others I most desire to close. For such an International 

 Committee as is proposed by the Entomological Society of 

 London would be a Court of Appeal by which, in the long run, 

 personal idiosyncrasies would be overruled. I should indeed 

 welcome, if practicable, an arrangement by which a new name 

 should be held to have been only proposed, not published, until 

 it had been registered by such a Committee, it being open to 

 any one to enter an objection before a National Committee to 

 any name proposed, and registration taking place in the ordinary 

 course, if within a given time no objection had been lodged. 

 This course would, if it could be arranged, render all synonymy 

 (beyond the mass which already exists) impossible for the future. 



If it be objected that an International Committee already 

 exists, I would reply — not such a committee as our Society 

 proposes, a scheme of which the national committees form a 

 most important part. For not only must the greater part of 

 the work be done by these, but there are points of which they 

 only could take cognizance. For example, the astounding series 

 of generic names, so-called, proposed in the Hemiptera, would 

 in their Greek-looking dress probably pass muster except before 

 an English-speaking committee — I refer to Ochisme, Polychisme,. 

 and the rest — and would not be detected as the frantic appeals 

 of the author for the embraces of his lady friends, tokens of 

 afíection from which, in view of the order for which the names 

 were designed, one would have thought he would have preferred 

 to be excused. These names may not be offensive " from their 

 irreverence," nor " pohtically," nor perhaps even " morally," 

 but they certainly do offend both against seemUness and common 

 sense. They are, of course, self-condemned, and utterly im- 

 possible of acceptance. 



There are two further points on which I should wish to 

 touch, both referring to varietal and aberrational names. First, 

 though the position is, I know, an unpopular one, I would plead 

 for very serious consideration before any attempt whatever is 

 made to Hmit the cases to which they may legitimate!}- be 

 applied. To argue that the constant subdivision of species is. 



