Allen, " Truth versus Error r ^ 





we have no points not covered and much better stated in his 

 former comparatively short paper in the October number of ' The 

 Auk.' As the real points in the case have already been sufficiently 

 met in my paper following Mr. Elliot's in the October ' Auk.' all 

 I would ask of any interested reader would be to reread that 

 article in the present connection. Mr. Elliot himself is doubtless 

 well aware that satire is not argument. The last half of his 

 ' Truth versus Error ' is mainly a plea for the plaintiff, while the 

 first part is an attempt to mislead in respect to the real point at 

 issue ; neither calls for special comment. To show the character 

 of Mr. Elliot's defense, one or two points may be noted. First, 

 the kind of " stability in nomenclature " here involved is simply 

 that relating to the emendation or rejection of names on purely 

 philological grounds. Hence, it was not " a happily grasped 

 afterthought," by which I saved myself from " a disastrous over- 

 throw," as Mr. Elliot knowingly (it would be discrediting his 

 intelligence to think otherwise) misrepresents the situation. 



Mr. Elliot refers triumphantly to the "Great Catalogue of 

 Birds," meaning probably the British Museum Catalogue of Birds, 

 as an example of where Canon XL has been " completely ignored 

 and repudiated " by eminent authorities. But he has failed to 

 tell his readers how many and what other Canons of the A. O. U. 

 Code were equally "completely ignored and repudiated" by 

 these same eminent authorities, as, for example, that fixing the 

 date of the beginning of binomial nomenclature at 1758 instead of 

 1766, and that providing a trinomial nomenclature for subspecies. 

 This was done, too, in the face of the fact that these two prin- 

 ciples have come to be accepted by so large a number of other 

 ' eminent authorities' as to have been incorporated into the recent 

 international codes of nomenclature, and have been otherwise 

 quite generally adopted. 



Mr. Elliot refers to the fact that one member of the A. O. U. 

 Committee agrees with him on the subject of Canon XL, and 

 rather intimates that if we knew the whole truth in the case there 

 might be others on his side also. He -can be assured that such 

 is not the case ; and if he had been present at a discussion of this 

 matter at the last meeting of the A. O. U. he would have been 

 much enlightened, and possibly surprised, by the unanimity with 



