Natural Historij of East Flnmarh. 569 



really little in common. His work, moreover^ contained a 

 most serious mistake. He acted in it as though there were 

 no such things as rules of nomenclature, casting aside many 

 old genera as though they never existed and misapplying 

 others. The primary law of nomenclature, whicli alone can 

 save zoology from hopeless confusion, is that " The name 

 originally given by the founder of a group or the describer 

 of a species should be permanently retained, to the exclusion 

 of all subsequent synonyms. '^ The mistake of Hincks in 

 this matter and the injustice caused to previous writers 

 must sooner or later be rectified. It is to be regretted that 

 this has not been done long since. Verrill has made some 

 corrections, and further delay will only render the necessary 

 changes when made the more serious, as it would allow of 

 the addition of further useless synonyms. I know of no 

 other class in which the law I have referred to has been so 

 ruthlessly set aside. Was it that Hincks was ignorant of all 

 law ? or was it that as the characters given to the old genera 

 were totally inadequate from the modern point of view, he 

 considered that they might be disregarded ? The answer is 

 that two items remain permanent, unless they be synonyms 

 of earlier described forms — the name of a genus and the 

 name of a species. The definition of a genus or species must 

 of necessity be continually changing with increasing know- 

 ledge of the forms themselves and of others more recently 

 discovered which are allied to them. If it were otherwise, 

 couldsomeofliincks^s own genera — say Schizoporella, Smiltia, 

 or Mucronella—he at this moment maintained with the 

 definition which he gave to them ? The following are 

 instances in which the law of priority was disregarded among 

 the Cheilostomata. 



Chorizopora Bron(jniartii. — The generic name is that of 

 Hincks, the specific of Audouin. Both must yield to 

 Berenicea p7'ominens, Lamouroux (Expos, method, des Genres 

 de POrd. des Polyp. 1821, p. 80, pi. Ixxx. figs. 1, 2). The type 

 of Lamouroux^s species was from the Mediterranean, and it 

 unquestionably was drawn from the netted state of the 

 species (see Hincks, Brit. Pol. pi. xxxii. fig. 2). There is an 

 earlier genus among Medusse — Berenice, Peron & Lesueur, 

 1809 — but the two generic names are sufficiently distinct. 



Schizoporella, Hincks, ought to have been named Escha- 

 7'ina, H. Milne-Edwards, since it included E. vulgaris (Moll) 

 (see Lamarck and Gray). But I have always considered 

 that E. vulyaris was wrongly placed by Hincks in his genus, 

 and that its keyhole-like oral opening and the avicularia 

 situated so low down on the zooecia, with theii: vibraculoid 



