Dr. Heinckoii on Fringilla Canaria, ^c. 73 



that his having made a distinct species of it is so readily accounted for, by 

 his having no doubt about the legitimacy of its representative. If " those 

 " of authority" in such matters admit that I have estabUshed my point, 

 it follows that the Linnaan Fring. Canaria must be expunged, and the 

 Fring. butyracea substituted for it. If they do not, I shall only mutter 

 for my inward satisfaction, " bastards and else," over their Catalogue, 

 and rest perfectly satisfied with having at all events unmade a 

 Fring. Canaria by converting it into a Fring. butyracea; for the 

 identity of the two species, call them by what name you will, is quite 

 beyond all cavil. That the error has existed so long is owing partly to 

 the injudicious preference too frequently given to bulky, faithless " trans- 

 lations," " compilations," and " improvements," forsooth ! over ori- 

 ginal works. Gmelin's 13th Edition of Lin neeus, as it is called, I have 

 had the good fortune never to be burdened with, but in an evil hour a 

 kind friend bestowed upon me the seven ponderous tomes of that kindred 

 spirit, Turton. In this work. Vol. I, p. 559, the habitat is altered from 

 " Madeira" to " India," and it is added, " Bill and legs brown, 4^ 

 " inches long, sings finely." All this is done without one word in 

 explanation. An act of forgery* on an illustrious name, is, in fact, 



list might be made; the following, however, almost as extensively spread as 

 man himself, are unknown to us :— the Raven, Crow, Cuckoo, Daw, Magpie, 

 Sparrow (both house and hedge). Pheasant, Thrush, Sky-lark, and Nightingale. 

 There are several others which do not occur to me at the uioment, 



* Whoever translates or revises an original work, and does not honestly 

 point out every deviation from the text; and whatever compiler introduces, or 

 alters, a word in a sentence marked as a quotation ; is guilty of a literary fraud. 

 In the last Number (XVI.) of the Zoological Journal, Mr. Bennett has restored 

 a Linnrean species (Mas Barharus), which cither Gmelin's conceit or his in- 

 stinctive propensity towards the erroneous (an obliquity by no means unusual 

 with this sort of gentry) had for years excluded. 



The first time I opened Mr. Starke's work, was at the Anohium pertinax, 

 which he gives as Latreille's, putting at the end of the description (which is 

 between inverted commas) " Lat. Gen. 1, 276." Now the " Genera" (Ed. 1806.) 

 does not contain a description of the Anob. pertinax : neither, to prevent all 

 subterfuge, is it a correct quotation of any description of any Anobium, in any 

 of Latreille's works. In birds too, (these occurred accidentally, for I have 

 not examined half a doicu iu the two vohuucs,) that of the Anlhus rufescens. 



