Miscellaneous. 331 



present writer replaced the name Thi/nnus by the term Orycnus, 

 which was substituted, inasmuch as Thijnnns was used for a genus 

 of Hymenopterous insects by Fabricius in 1775. This name Oryc- 

 nus was simpljr due to a misreading of the name Orcynus, and was 

 subsequently replaced by Orcynus in its correct form. Nevertheless 

 in 18(53 Dr. J. G. Cooper, in the ' Proceedings of the California 

 Academy of Natural Sciences ' (vol. iii. p. 77), proposed to revert to 

 the old groups of Cuvier in the following terms, describing a supposed 

 new species related to the Alalonga of the Mediterranean, which he 

 called Orcynas pacijicus: — 



" This species is one of several confounded by sailors under the 

 Spanish names of Albicore and Eouito. The English name Tunny 

 is applied to an allied species on the coast of Europe, the Thynntu^ 

 vulgaris, Cav., and to its near representative, the T. secundi-dorsalis, 

 Htorer, of the eastern Americaii coast. These, however, are evidently 

 of a different genus, and, as Thijnnus is preoccupied in insects, the 

 name Orycnns, applied by Gill to the same type, may perhaps be 

 retained, altbough/oHucfoZ on a mistdke." 



Without reference to the reality of what was so evident to Dr, 

 Cooper, we need only recall that here the name Orycnns was speci- 

 fically proposed to be retained at the same time that Orcynus was 

 used for a related genus. 



In 1888 Professor Jordan, in the ' Proceedings of the Academy of 

 Natural Sciences of Philadelphia ' (reprinted in the ' Annals and 

 Magazine of Natural History ' for 1888, ii. p. 356), apparently over- 

 looking this specific application of the name Orycnus by Cooper, 

 proposed the new name Alhacora for the same genus, inasmuch as 

 Orcynus had been used in 18 15 for a genus of Carangids by Eafiuesque, 

 while Thynnus of Cuvier, as is well known, had been preoccupied 

 for a genus of Hymenopterous insects. 



The present author would have been glad if the name Orycnns 

 could have fallen into " innocuous desuetude ; " but inasmuch as it 

 had been specifically and with malice ^vepcnse resurrected and pro- 

 posed for retention by Cooper, it must surely be retained for the 

 genus comprising the Tunny and Albicore. It belongs to a category 

 of which there are many illustrations, being an anagram of another 

 name, and numerous such have been proposed deliberately and gene- 

 rally adopted, such as PanuUrus and Linuparus, anagrams of Pali- 

 nurus, and various others. 



If it is represented that the word Orycnus is merely due to a slip 

 of the pen or typographical error, and therefore should not be re- 

 tained, we can, in reply, refer for an analogous retention of an 

 incorrect form to no less an authority than Professor Jordan. In 

 the fifth edition of his excellent work ' A Manual of the Vertebrate 

 Animals of the Northern United States,' published a couple of 

 months ago (1888, p. 92), we find the word Athlennes, which was 

 originally proposed in 1886 as a designation for the Belone Mans of 

 Cuvier and Valenciennes. As we suspected at the time of publica- 

 tion, this name is really derived from an ancient Greek synonym of 

 the common Belone belone of Europe, "a/jAe)'»'//5, without raucositv." 



