Emu 



120 Royal Australasian Ornithologists' Union. [ist^'j 



tender my best thanks to the members of the Council for the great 

 assistance which they have given to me on every occasion when 

 requested. 



A. Chas. Stone, Hon. Sec. R.A.O.U. 



Problems of Nomenclature, 



Presidential Address by A. H. E. Mattingley, C.M.Z.S. 



The system of zoological nomenclature in its application to 

 Australian birds has been agitating the minds of members of the 

 Royal Australasian Ornithologists' Union since the 1912 annual 

 session at Launceston, when the Check-list Committee presented 

 its report. It has become a vexed question with us. The 

 members were chosen for their experience in the science of orni- 

 thology, and it was confidently expected that the Committee 

 would succeed in presenting an acceptable and uniform check-list 

 of Australian birds, satisfying alike to all ornithologists, whether 

 cabinet or field workers. 



Although the painstaking and arduous efforts of the Check- 

 List Committee have won the admiration of all for the 

 comprehensive exposition of the whole subject and the exhaustive 

 research on, and critical examination of, our avifprms, yet 

 some disagree with the report. These dissentients aver that 

 the subject-matter of the report, first of all, does not subscribe 

 to the adopted and authorized International Code in respect 

 to the naming of birds with sub-specific differentiation, and, 

 secondly, that there is a lack of strict adherence to the law 

 of priority. These opponents claim that the law of priority is a 

 just law, and that the Check-list is inconsistent, because, while 

 declaring that the use of binomials is the simplest and easiest 

 system of nomenclature for the overworked student, it uses at 

 random a polynomial system for its vernacular names. 



The position of President of the Union as captain of the 

 aeroplane, to use a modern simile, renders it incumbent on him 

 to study the physical condition environing his charge, and to 

 direct the course with as much skill and ability as he possesses, 

 so that the machine and its freight may be safely delivered at 

 the end of the journey, and that the machine may be still kept 

 flying by his successor for the benefit of scientific advancement 

 and the addition to the sum total of human knowledge. I will 

 endeavour to chart out the course which, in my opinion, it is 

 best to pursue in regard to the nomenclature of our Australian 

 birds. 



For the orderly disposition of knowledge and the demonstration 

 of one of the great corollaries of that theorem evolution, most 

 of us will admit that birds are distinguished from other animals, 

 hence the need of placing them in a separate class. Next, we 

 must inquire how they are related to and distinguished from one 



