iS8S.] Elliot ou the Jucanidcr. 295 



shoulders and coverts. Primaries and secondaries as in the achilts. 

 Runi]) and upper tail-coverts chestnut. Tail hronzy brown. Frontal 

 and siile wattles rudimentary, red. Bill apparently bluish at base of 

 maxilla, remaintler yellow. Lciijs and feet olive. Total lenyth, 9; 

 win^-, 5i ; tail, 2\\ bill (culmen), i j inches. Specimens vary in size. 



Habitat. Trinichul (Lcotaud). Angostura, Venezuela (Uni- 

 laulT). Parahyha, Brazil (Forbes). Para (Leyard). Cruniha, 

 Brazil (Smith). Argentine Republic (Hudson). Colombia 

 (Wyatt). Qjiito, Conadon (Alexander). Peru (Jelski and 

 Stolzniaiui, Bartlett). Yunga.s, Bolivia (Rusby). 



Linnajus (1. c.) founded this species in 1766, upon the plate 

 357 in Edwards's drawings called by him, "the Spur-winged 

 Water Hen of Brazil," and gave to it the name oi Parra jacana^ 

 thus employing for his specific term, that of the genus given to 

 these birds by Brisson six years previously, and substituting for 

 that genus the new one Pai-ra. The codes of the American and 

 British Ornithologists' Unions have provided, more or less satis- 

 factorily, rules to govern cases when specific names have been 

 elevated to generic rank, and told us what is to be done with 

 such parvenues \ but neither of them have a word to say as to 

 the proper course of procedure when generic terms are reduced 

 to specific rank, and ornithological nomenclature becomes 

 enriched by such an abominable instance of tautology as exhibited 

 in the name which this, luckily wide-footed, bird is compelled 

 to carry about. Brisson is an acce]:)ted authoiit\' foi genera, and 

 consequently JacuJia must stand, but I employ Linna'us's specific 

 name under protest, believing that he had no riglit to willfully 

 ignore the works of previous authors, any more than have orni- 

 thologists of the present day, and I think that jacaiia shoukl be 

 rejected as a specific term, and another one substituted. I commend 

 this case to the consideration of the two Unions aforesaid, in 

 order that a similar occurrence may be rendered nugatory in the 

 future, iia way can be found to make it so. Linnaeus probably 

 never saw a specimen of Jacana, his knowledge of these birds 

 being confined mainly to li^dwards's and Brisson's plates and des- 

 criptions, and consequently his description o( P. Jacafia is very 

 much mixed, and would seem to apply to two species — the corpus 

 to y. nigra {Jacana armata nigra Briss.), the dorso to J. 

 jacana. 



