178 



Recent Literatiirc. 



pigment procured by Church bj boiling a sohition of Turacin for a long 

 time. 



Zoorubin, a red-brown pigment occurring in Citicinnttrus regius is next 

 described. In solubility it much resembles the preceeding, but has no 

 absorption band, though all of the spectrum beyond D is absorbed. When 

 treated with a very small quantity of copper-sulphate. Zoorubin instantly 

 becomes cherry-red, a characteristic reaction. This pigment occurs in 

 the brown female paradise bird though not in other brown birds, as Siri'x 

 flammea and Alcedo ispida. As regards tlie colors oi Rclectus polycJilorns, 

 where green, blue, red, yellow and brown may all be found, the author 

 has brought out some very interesting points. The blue and green are 

 mechanical, or rather the blue is mechanical and the green is the result 

 of a yellow pigment overlying a brown one. The true pigments of the 

 feathers are brown, yellow, and red. If the feathers be blackened on 

 their under surfaces with lampblack or sepia, they become blue. If the 

 yellow feathers are treated in a similar way, they become green. The 

 yellow pigment is Zoofulvin, the red probably Zoonerythrin. 



Lastly the author describes the yellow pigment. Coriosulfurin, found 

 in the tarsus of the birds of prey. This substance is unlike any known to 

 occur in feathers. It has three absorption bands between Fand G. — J. A.J. 



Stejneger's NoMENCL.\Ti'R.\L INNOVATIONS.* — Proposing to use '-the 

 oldest available name in ever\' case," the author shows that many of our 

 current names must give way if the '• inflexible law of priority" is to be 

 observed.. For ourselves, we believe that the surest way out of the nomen- 

 clatural difficulties that beset us is to be found in some such simple rule 

 as this, and that to upset every name that can be upset according to an\ 

 recognized principle is really the shortest road to that fixitv of nomencla- 

 ture for which we now all sigh like furnaces. Still such a paper as this 

 makes us wish, as so manji' others have done, that some counteractive 

 "statute of limitation" could come into operation, by which a bird resting 

 in undisturbed enjoyment of its name for, say, a century or half a century, 

 should not be liable to eviction under the common law of priority. Human 

 welfare and happiness on the whole is the final cause of all law, and in 

 the case of titles to real estate it is we believe statutory that undisturbed 

 possession for a certain period shall exempt property-holders from litiga- 

 tion on account of any adverse claim. howe\'er otherwise sound, which is 

 not presented within a certain number of years. This seems to be neces- 

 sary for the security' of any title, and to proceed upon the theory that if 

 owners don't take the trouble to make good their title in due time they 

 ought to forfeit it. The logic of a bird's right to its name and a posses- 

 sor's right to any other property is the same in theory, and might properly 

 be carried into eflect. Fifty years of unchallenged usage might do, and a 



* On some generic and specific appellations of North American Birds. By Leonliaid 

 Stejneger. Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., June, 1882, pp. 28-43. 



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