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typical John Smith, and then, by simply knowinpf his name, we could easily find 

 out his address and all that was kno\vn about him. Any other John Smith 

 would have a different specific name, so that all confusion would be thenceforth 

 avoided. 



The practice was so simple, and has long worked so well, that the scientific 

 world is unwilling, even after the lapse of more than a century, to depart from it. 

 But we must remember that in Linnaaus's day the doctrine of special creation was 

 simply universal ; men thought that species remained unchanged for all time. 

 Only now the schoolmaster has been abroad, and we have learnt that every species, 

 to become a species, has continually undergone, and is still undergoing, some 

 modification, however slight that modification be, or however long it take to 

 become apparent. Indeed, the difficulty now is to determine the question. What 

 is a species ? I do not propose to vie with the logicians in finding a satisfactory 

 solution of this query, but it is enough to note that a species is considered to be a 

 species when it is not connected with any other (however intimately allied) species 

 by intermediate forms ; that it and its nearest allies are never, in the greatest 

 series of specimens, confused by the existence of individuals referable to either 

 form ; that is, that in the course of ages it has become entirely dififerentiated, in 

 some important particular or particulars, from every other form. 



Now, when those best capable, from e.Kperience, of forming a correct opinion 

 have determined what may rightly be considered a true species, we find that in 

 different countries, or under different conditions, individuals of the same species 

 vary in a more or less conspicuous degree. These are allowed the rank of sub- 

 species, and the intergrading forms are grouped and named according to the 

 most marked types that they present ; and if forms vary when they occur in 

 countries far distant from one another, a very slight difference is allowed .sub- 

 specific rank. 



Here it is that " trinomialism " steps in to help us. We discard the old 

 interpolations: "var." "subsp.," &c. We keep the old generic name, we keep 

 the old specific name, and we add a third name to indicate the sub-species. 

 A species having a third name is by that very fact relegated to the species 

 indicated by its second name ; but it is thereby degraded from the typical 

 species, because, different though it may essentially seem, intermediate forms 

 are found to occur. A species, indeed, stands as such, because, to use the 

 words of Dr. Coues, " its differentiation is accomplished ; " a sub-species 

 stands as such because the links connecting it with allied forms are existent 

 still. The whole is but a question of time and circumstance ; the sub-species 

 of to-day may become, when the connecting links are lost, the species of 

 to-morrow. We are only concerned with what we see and know. Names but 

 indicate the pigeon-holes where, for a time, we may stow whatever knowledge we 

 can gather about the titles we choose to put upon them ; the titles matter nothing 

 so long as we can find the required pigeon-holes, and to this orderly arrangement 

 all science tends, or its result is chaos. Numbers, indeed, would do as well as 

 names, if we knew all existing or possible species ; only this we can never know, 

 and. moreover, names we can arrange as we please, whereas numbers insist upon 



