April 17, 19 13] 



NATURE 



The Hon. Walter Rothschild emphasised the 

 point that any society or individual proposing such 

 an important change as that proposed by the 

 German Zoological Society ought, if they wanted 

 serious consideration at all, to put their meaning 

 in absolutely clear and unequivocal language. He 

 stated that the time quoted, " twelve " years, as 

 being sufficient to judge of the need of the 

 "law of priority" was absurd, as it would take at 

 least two generations for the law in question to 

 settle nomenclature in general, and at least one 

 generation before we could judge of its effects. 

 Mr. Rothschild also stated that a progressive list 

 of exceptions to that law, namely, one to be aug- 

 mented from congress to congress, would lead to 

 utter chaos. He was opposed to any exceptions 

 whatever, but would be willing to see, in cases 

 where confusion was likely to arise, that names 

 for a long time employed for one genus or species, 

 and which under the rules must be transferred to 

 another, should be dropped altogether, and that 

 names differing only in one letter from any already 

 in use should be treated as inadmissible. He 

 was also in favour of using larval names, and 

 those founded on a single phase only, being 

 used in that sense only, and not under the 

 law of priority used for the adult in another 

 phase. 



Finally, it was resolved — that plenary power 

 is herewith conferred upon the international com- 

 mission in zoological nomenclature acting for this 

 congress to suspend the regies as applied to any 

 given case, where in its judgment the strict appli- 

 cation of the regies will clearly result in greater 

 confusion than uniformity, provided, however, 

 that not less than one year's notice shall be given 

 in any two or more of the following publications, 

 namely, Bulletin de la Societe Zoologique de 

 France, Monitor Zoologica, Nature, Science 

 (N.Y.), and Zoologischer Anseiger; that a ques- 

 tion of the possible suspension of the regie as 

 applied to such cases is under consideration, 

 thereby making it possible for zoologists, parti- 

 cularly specialists in the group in question, to 

 present arguments for and against the suspension 

 under consideration ; and provided also that the 

 veto of the commission is unanimously in favour 

 of suspension if not less than two-thirds be 

 present. The commission is hereby instructed to 

 report the facts to the next succeeding inter- 

 national congress. — It was also resolved "That 

 the congress fully approves of the plan that 

 has been inaugurated by the commission of 

 conferring with special committees from the 

 special groups involved in any given case, 

 and that it authorises and instructs the com- 

 mission to continue and extend their policy." 

 Altogether, the conclusions arrived at appear thor- 

 oughly satisfactory, especially as the plenary 

 power of the commission is very adequately safe- 

 guarded. 



The invitation of the Government of Hungary 

 to hold the congress of 1916 in Budapest was 

 accepted, and Prof. Hovarth, of Budapest, was 

 elected president. 



NO. 2268, VOL. 91] 



THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF 

 HISTORICAL STUDIES. 



1HE members of the International Congress of 

 Historical Studies have been holding their 

 meetings in London, under the presidency of Mr. 

 James Bryce, who was, however, unfortunately 

 absent throughout the proceedings. Five years 

 ago, the congress held very successful meetings in 

 Berlin, and ten years ago it assembled under 

 favourable auspices in Rome. If the London meet- 

 ing has attracted less notice in the country of its 

 assembling than the two preceding ones, it has 

 none the less produced some excellent papers, and it 

 must be accounted a real loss to the general publi- 

 that the very faulty organisation of the congress, 

 combined with our insular aloofness and the ignor- 

 ance of modern languages which is an accepted 

 item of English education, has prevented the 

 meetings from receiving their due share of atten- 

 tion. 



The congress has covered so large a field of his- 

 torical studies that any general survey of its 

 deliberations would be impossible in this place. 

 It has discussed the philosophy of history and 

 the history of historical studies, while other sec- 

 tions have met daily to exchange views on Egyp- 

 tian, classical, Byzantine, and Oriental history, 

 as well as on matters pertaining to military, naval 

 and colonial, religious and ecclesiastical, legal and 

 economic, mathematical and scientific, studies. 



The President of the Board of Education (Mr. 

 J. Pease) directed attention to the frequent con- 

 nection that has existed in England between 

 history and politics, citing the names of Claren- 

 don, Gibbon, and Macaulay, and, at the present 

 time, of Bryce and Trevelyan. The advantages of 

 such a connection may perhaps be questioned. 

 From it has resulted the habit of treating history 

 as a branch of politics rather than of considering 

 politics as a department of history. The current 

 text-book treatment of the English civil war and 

 the American revolution — to give but two in- 

 stances — has probably suffered much in its accu- 

 racy from the fact that the principal English 

 historians have been primarily Whig politicians. 

 To the popular conception of the politician as the 

 sufficient and efficient historian, we may perhaps 

 attribute the neglect by successive Governments 

 of the marvellous series of records — the admira- 

 tion and envy of other European nations, and the 

 best material for history — which belong to this 

 nation. No one knows better than Prof. C. H. 

 Firth, who dealt with the subject of English 

 records, how badly kept, how inaccessible, how 

 uncalendared, are a great proportion of our 

 English public documents. 



It was entirely characteristic of the English 

 politician-historian that, at the Oxford dinner, 

 Lord Morley of Blackburn should warn his hearers 

 against laying too much stress on research in 

 diplomatic archives and parish registers, and 

 should remind his audience that, fortunately or 

 unfortunately, sentiment and prejudice have had 

 far more to do with the making of history than 

 reason and precedent. 



