256 On Generic Nomenclature. 



says in torn. xiii. of his Histoire. The fifth inaccuracy is, in 

 citing Fabricius's characters of the genus, when it is self-evi- 

 dent, from the insects he made congeneric, that he knew nothing 

 at all about it. Fabricius is certainly a bad authority for 

 genera; and his only value is as a describer of species. The 

 sixth inaccuracy is, where (at the end of the same paragraph 

 in which all these errors occur, and which is only twelve lines 

 long, consequently a very small space to contain so many 

 inaccuracies !), in referring to the Pemphredon lugubris, he 

 says, " which has bidentate mandibles, and a long peduncle 

 to the abdomen." This is a crowning error, for certainly no 

 Pemphredon, even as the genus stood before Mr. Curtis and 

 myself dismembered it, possessed the combined characters of 

 " bidentate mandibles," and " a long peduncle to the abdo- 

 men." This, I hope, is sufficient to show that I have not 

 unjustly charged Mr. Westwcod with " a string of inac- 

 curacies." 



But it is time that I finish ; and I will therefore merely 

 advert to one remark, which especially struck me in perusing 

 the papers ; and I will then sum up. 



Towards the end of his first paper, he asks the startling 

 question, " How is it possible to form a name derived from 

 several Greek words, and confine it always within the bounds of 

 three syllables?" This is certainly a puzzler, and there is 

 much originality in it ; but it is plainly in behalf of his be- 

 loved sesquipedalia.* 



But, to sum up, the argument concludes thus : — Latreille 

 established the genus Pemphredon in 1796, without naming 

 a type; in 1802, he repeats it, and names the type as Crabro 

 lugubris of Fabricius, with which insect the combination of 

 characters agrees, and only one apparently disagrees. He 

 partly repeats this in 1805, and again names the same type. 

 In 1809, he again describes the genus, and here all the cha- 

 racters entirely conform to the type ; but, under a different 

 genus, he refers to another insect, which is placed under this 

 different genus, as having been the original type of his genus 

 Pemphredon. But this assertion, by a critical investigation of 

 the combination of characters, is shown to be erroneous ; and 

 that the insect he had, from 1802, considered as, and named 

 as, the type, was so certainly; and, consequently, the genus 

 Pemphredon must stand as follows, and not as Mr. Westwood 

 has given it at p. 173. of this Volume. 



* " Nomina generica sesquipedalia, enuneiatu difficilia vel nauseabunda, 

 fugienda sunt." And again : " Pulchritudo artis brevitatem exposcit, nam 

 quo simplieius, eo etiam et melius, et stultum est facerc per plum, quod fieri 

 potest per pauciora ; Natura etiam ipsa compendiosissima est in omni sua 

 actione." (Linncetis, Phil. Bof.) 



