Oeneric Name o/Asterias sanguinolenta. 473 



same extent as an earlier [is] to be wholly cancelled; " so 

 Agassiz would have done better had he kept his expressive 

 name to himself, and Cribrella must fall out of our nomen- 

 clature alto2:ether. 



But in this case what is to be done with Asterias sanguino- 

 lenta? One would imagine that it was in sad want of a 

 generic name when Edward Forbes perpetrated the robbery 

 which is now only (after half a century!) revealed to a world 

 that has been taught to revere his name. In mitigation we 

 may say that it might have so seemed to him ; for, just before 

 his work was issued from the press, and certainly after it left 

 iiis hands, Gray proposed the name of Henricia for the Aste- 

 rias oculata of Pennant, which is the Asterias sanguinolenta 

 of O. F. Miiller * ; and, indeed, he thought perhaps he was 

 justified, for he had placed the species in Nardo's genus 

 Linckia (Mem. Wern. Soc. viii. p. 120) in 1839, and dis- 

 covered his error and the fact that Crihrella was a synonym 

 for that name a little later. 



The claims of Gray's name are incontestable ; the necessity 

 for changing the significance of such a well-known term as 

 Crihrella is most distressing, and I am very sorry that it has 

 fallen to my lot to have thus to upset a nomenclature which 

 we all know and which, I fear, I shall in my heart continue 

 to use. 



I cannot conceive how or why succeeding writers have let 

 the matter stand in this disorderly manner so long. Some 

 — to cite the most careful of them, Mr. Sladen; — write Crihrella 

 (pars); but certainly Agassiz does not include anything, either 

 recent or fossil, under his generic name which can by any 

 possibility be supposed to be congeneric with A. sanguino- 

 lenta. 



The correct synonymy of the genus appears to stand 

 thus : — 



Henricia. 



Henricia, Gray, Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. vi. (1840), p. 184. 



Linkia, Forbes, not Nardo, Mem. Wern. Soc. viii. (1839), p. 120. 



Crihella, Forbes, not Ag., Brit. Starf. (1841), p. 106. 



Crihrella, Liilkeu, Grijul. Echinod. (1857), p. 30, et mult. al. ustjue ad 



Sladen in Chall. Rep., Ast. (1889), p. 540. 

 EcMnaster, M. Tr. Syst. Ast. (1842), p. 22 (pars). 



* The dates appear to be: — the part of Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (vi. 

 p. 184) which contained Gray's name Henricia was published Nov. 1840; 

 Forbes's p. 100, on which 'Cribdla appeared, was probably published 

 Dec. 1st, 1841. Messrs. Gurney and Jackson have been so obliging as to 

 give me the dates of publication of the six parts of Forbes's 'British 

 Starfishes ; ' they were published on the first of each month from October 

 1840 to March 1841, But the work as a whole must be quoted 1841. 



Ann. & Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 6. Vol. vi. 34 



