190 Mr. G. R. Gray's Catalogue of 



example of other authors, both in this country and abroad, who 

 have not thought it desirable to leave them "unnoticed and for- 

 gotten." 



The reviewer next expresses his " fear that confusion is hkely to 

 be caused by the introduction of the French names which Mr. Gray 

 has permitted in some parts of his list." If the objection had been 

 that these names have been introduced too rarely, it would, as it 

 seems to me, have been better founded. No harm can result from 

 their insertion, except the unpleasantness arising from the indication 

 that, in too many instances, those who have done nothing more than 

 apply a Latin name to a division already clearly established under a 

 French one, have thus cheaply obtained the credit of having esta- 

 blished that division for themselves. To avoid the necessity of 

 appealing to recent cases, let us pass for a moment from genera to 

 species, and call to mind the natural indignation which has been 

 universally felt and expressed at the wholesale appropriation by 

 Gmelin of hundreds of species of birds established by Latham under 

 English names, but which one of the most ignorant of compilers 

 conveyed to himself simply by converting Latham's English into 

 Latin. For this reason, on the plain principle of smim cuiqtie, it 

 will be my endeavour to increase rather than to curtail the citations 

 of such names, the Latinization of which, in many cases, requires 

 merely the slightest alteration in the termination to render them 

 much more euphonious than the Greek compounds, which it has 

 been proposed to substitute in their places. Thus the Picazuros* of 

 M. Lesson have been latinized by M. O. DesMurs under the generic 

 name of Picazurus ; and I think no one will deny that Picazurus 

 gymnophthalmus would be at once a better-sounding denomination 

 than Ci'ossojjhthalmus gymnophthalmus, and more just to the ori- 

 ginal author of the division. 



A modern author of some note was considered to have overcharged 

 a branch of Ornithology "with new and useless denominations," 

 because he gave Greek compounds to those di^^sious which had pre- 

 viously received French names ; while I am accused of causing con- 

 fusion by simply recording the existence of these previous names. 



The next point on which the reviewer thinks the principles which 

 I have adopted "do not work well," has reference to the question 

 "what edition of the ' Systema Naturae ' we ought to begin with," — 

 a question which he says " has been already discussed in a previous 

 re^aew of a former edition of Mr. Gray's book in this INIagazine ; " 

 and a note at the bottom of the page refers us to " Mr. Strickland's 

 article in the 'Annals and Magazine' for 1851." The date, how- 

 ever, is widely incorrect, Mr. Strickland's article having been pub- 

 hshed in January 1842. Li that paper the author, after some 

 mistaken remarks on Moehring, thinks "a strong case" has been 

 "made out for establishing a statute of limitations." "Let natu- 

 ralists," he continues, "agree once for all, to draw an absolute line 

 at the date of 1 760, when the elaborate standard work of Brisson 



* This word is wTongly printed in the Catalogue as Picazores, an en-or 

 copied by the reviewer. 



