RULES OF ZOOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE. 29 



and to give their sanction to these Eules and Recommendations as now pro- 

 posed to be modified. 



Signed on the part of the members of Committee 



present at Birmingham * by "Wm. Jardine, Reporter. 



On the preceding Report being read to Section D, upon Tuesday, 19th 

 September, the following motion was made and carried unanimously : — 



Moved by Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, seconded by Dr. Sclater, — That the Re- 

 port now read be approved of and adopted by the Section, and that 

 the Rides or propositions, as thereby altered and amended, be printed 

 in the Reports of the British Association and recommended for the 

 general use of zoologists. 



PART I. 



RULES FOR RECTIFYING THE PRESENT ZOOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE. 



[Limitation of the Plan to Systematic Nomenclature.'] 

 In proposing a measure for the establishment of a permanent and uni- 

 versal zoological nomenclature, it must be premised that we refer solely to 

 the Latin or systematic language of zoology. We have nothing to do with 

 vernacular appellations. One great cause of the neglect and corruption 

 wbich prevails in the scientific nomenclature of zoology, has been the 

 frequent and often exclusive use of vernacular names in lieu of the Latin 

 binomial designations, which form the only legitimate language of systematic 

 zoology. Let us then endeavour to render perfect the Latin or Linnajan 

 method of nomenclature, which, being far removed from the scope of national 

 vanities and modern antipathies, holds out the only hope of introducing into 

 zoology that grand desideratum, an universal language. 



[Laiu of Priority the only effectual and just one.~\ 

 It being admitted on all hands that words are only the conventional signs 

 of ideas, it is evident that language can only attain its end effectually by 

 being permanently established and generally recognized. This consideration 

 ought, it would seem, to have checked those who are continually attempting 

 to subvert the established language of zoology by substituting terms of their 

 own coinage. But, forgetting the true nature of language, they persist in 

 confounding the name of a species or group with its definition ; and because 

 the former often falls short of the fulness of expression found in the latter, 

 they cancel it without hesitation, and introduce some new term which 

 appears to them more characteristic, but which is utterly unknown to the 

 science, and is therefore devoid of all authority f. If these persons were to 

 object to such names of men as Long, Little, Armstrong, Golightly, &c, in cases 

 where they fail to apply to the individuals who bear them, or shoidd complain 

 of the names Gough, Lawrence, or Harvey, that they were devoid of meaning, 

 and should hence propose to change them for more characteristic appella- 

 tions, they woidd not act more unphilosophically or inconsiderately than 

 they do in the case before us ; for, in truth, it matters not in the least by 

 what conventional sound we agree to designate an individual object, provided 

 the sign to be employed be stamped with such an authority as will suffice to 



* The Members of the Committee present at Birmingham were A. E. Wallace, Professor 

 Babington, Dr. Francis, Dr. Sclater, C. Spence Bate, P. P. Carpenter, Professor Balfour, 

 H. T. Stainton, J. Gwyn Jeffreys, A. Newton, G. Bentham, and Sir W. Jardine, Bart. 

 (Reporter). 



t Linnseus says on this subject, " Abstinendum ab hac innovatione qure nonquam 

 cessaret, quin indies aptiora detegerentur ad infinitum," 



