140 SCIENCE SKETCHES. 



who undertakes to restrict the comprehensive 

 genus should be taken as the type. If no such 

 restriction has taken place, the process of elimi- 

 nation, as laid down in Canon XXIII. , may be 

 applied. In both the latter cases, only those re- 

 strictions knowmgly made should be considered. 



The '* Code " agrees with most others in the 

 rejection of "■ nomina nuda " (bare names intro- 

 duced without explanation), but it differs from 

 most others in regarding a " typonym " (or generic 

 name established only by the indication of a typi- 

 cal species, and without diagnosis) as something 

 more than a " bare name," and as therefore worthy 

 of recognition. In this regard the " Code," justly 

 or not, is most likely to receive criticism from 

 workers in other fields. Most other departments 

 of zoology have but little to do with *' new gen- 

 era," defined solely by the specification of a type- 

 species. These *' typonyms " have been generally 

 discarded as the useless product of lazy or '* liter- 

 ary " naturalists on the general ground formulated 

 by Professor Cope, that " science ^ is science and 



1 The following are Professor Cope's remarks on this point : 

 " In the Proceedings of the United States National Museum, Pro- 

 fessor Gill insists on the adoption of a generic name proposed by 

 himself without description, in preference to a name proposed later, 

 by another author, whose description contains some errors. The 

 opposite course had been pursued by Professors Jordan and Gil- 

 bert, — a circumstance which gives rise to the criticism in question. 

 Professor Gill admits the facts to be as above stated, and there- 

 upon makes the following remarks : ' What is the advantage of 

 any description? According to the rules of the British and Amer- 

 ican Associations for the Advancement of Science, a description 

 is necessary as the basis of permanent nomenclature, but like 

 many of the other rules propounded in those codes, there is no 



