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CODE OF NOMENCLATURE. 



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ciety and of the International Geological Congres:., tend in the 

 direction of securing the utmost- attainable fixity oi names and 

 general stability in nomenclr.tur ,*, by giving the fullest scope 

 possible to the operation of the law of priority. 



De Candolle takes the first edition of the ' Species Plantarum,' 

 1753, as the starting-point of the binomial system in Botany, 

 and therefore as the date of the beginning of the law of pri- 

 ority in respect to species, — a point substantially agreed upon 

 by botanists. For generic names, however, he takes the first 

 edition of the * Genera Plantarum,' 1757; and his 'Article 15' 

 provides that each natural group of plants must retain the most 

 ancient name appended to it, if it be not inconsistent with the 

 essential rules of nomenclature, whether adopted or given by 

 Linnaeus, or since his time ; thus implying that the law of 

 priority is not to extend to authors earlier than Linnaeus. His 

 provisions in regard to the emendation of names are very strict. 

 His 'Article 60' is : * A generic name should subsist just as it 

 was made, though a purely typographical error may be corrected. 

 The termination of a Latin specific name may be changed to 

 bring it into agreement [in gender] with its generic name." 

 This is a marked change from his previous code, in which 

 Article 60 enjoined the suppression of hybrid names, or those 

 formed by the combination of two languages. 



It is evident, even from the foregoing brief and incomplete 

 summary of some leading authorities upon nomenclature, that 

 the general tendency at present is in the direction of the 

 greatest attainable fixity of names, by the most rigid adherence 

 to the law of priority under all practicable circumstances, and 

 by the disregard as far as possible of all rules requiring the 

 rejection of names for faulty construction, for barbarit}'', for 

 being meaningless, and even for being literally false, — changes 

 to be made only in cases of obvious typographical errors. The 

 emendations proposed by your Committee to be made in the 

 Stricklandian Code recognize this tendency, and are in harmony 

 with it. Your Committee, however, does not agree to any of 

 the dates which various codes take as their respective starting- 

 points in nomenclature, and especially does not deem it expe- 



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