Vol 'l*i9 XVI ] Notes and News. 449 



we only cause confusion. Presently some one else will suggest another 

 scheme and before we know it we shall have hopeless chaos and our indexes 

 will lead us nowhere. 



To those who have struggled long with the maze of published names and 

 who by the aid of well framed codes are beginning to see the solution of 

 that side of the nomenclatorial problem, it is discouraging to encounter 

 well intentioned innovations such as Mr. Taverner's, and the endless 

 activities of the genus splitter who has forgotten that a name is a name and 

 tries to make of it a phylogenetic expression which changes with every 

 user. There can be no rules to govern such phases of nomenclature which 

 will always be matters of personal opinion. Why not let well enough 

 alone?— W. S.] 



NOTES AND NEWS 



Dr. Lotjis Brasil, a Foreign Member of the B. O. U., who was elected 

 a Corresponding Fellow of the A. O. U. at the last meeting, died at Caen, 

 France, October 15, 1918, but the news of his death has only recently been 

 received. From 'The Ibis' we learn that Dr. Brasil was born in Paris in 

 1865 and at the time of his death was only 53 years of age. He was brought 

 up at Caen where he received his education and where he became Lecturer 

 and later Professor of Zoology in the University. He also served as Presi- 

 dent of the Linnaean Society of Normandy. 



His work included invertebrate zoology and geology as well as ornithology, 

 but on the latter subject he published several important papers. He 

 contributed the sections on Apteryges, Cassowaries, Cranes and Emus to 

 Wytsmann's 'Genera Avium,' 1905, and in 1914 published a little work on 

 the 'Shore- and Water-Birds of France, Belgium and the British Islands.' 

 Two years before his death he published a paper on the Birds of New Cale- 

 donia, containing descriptions of several new forms based on two collections 

 made by French officers in 1865-69 and deposited in the Caen Museum. 

 Dr. Brasil contributed several papers and short notes to the 'Revue 

 Franchise d'Ornithologie' and also to 'The Ibis.' His writings and his 

 work in general were characterized by care and accuracy. — T. S. P. 



Frederick Bridgham McKechnie, an Associate of the A. O. U. from 

 1900 to 1911, was born in Dorchester, Mass., Sept. 19, 1882, and lived 

 there until about 1900 when his family moved to Ponkapog, Mass. He 

 seems always to have been interested in birds, and this move from a subur- 

 ban district to Ponkapog, a small country town west of the Milton Hills, 

 and in a setting of as wild country as there is in eastern Massachusetts, 

 was distinctly congenial. 



