es ore 
LS ee 
zr, 53.] TO JAMES D. DANA. 521 
put our questions variously according to the leadings 
of the case at the time. But this is all commonplace 
and trite. 
It is curious to see that Owen, in his Aye-aye paper, 
has come to adopt Heer’s ! views essentially, of course 
without the slightest allusion to Heer. 
Our civil war goes on slowly, but very surely, to- 
ward the destruction of negro slavery; and with all 
its great cost, we may hope for future benefit in pro- 
portion. By the time we have nearly ended our war, 
it may be that Europe will have its turn again. I 
hope not. A. Gray. 
TO JAMES D. DANA. 
CamerincE, January 20, [1864]. 
My pear Dana, — Perhaps you may not know, 
and I hope you may be as pleased as I was to know, 
that your article of last summer on Geological Periods 
is reprinted in full in the “ Reader” (of London), 
with an appreciative prefix. 
Cephalization goes on bravely in your very taking 
article which you have just sent me. I am much 
struck with it. 
Tn one thing you zodlogists miss it, I think, — in 
following French customs in dropping the Latin, the 
vernacular of science, in names. I wish you would 
write Aphaniptera, etc., which is just as much Eng- 
lish after all as Aphanipters, and good for all lan- 
ages, 
Have Englishified contractions for all such names 
if you will; it is well. But in proposing and formally 
1 Oswald Heer, 1809-1883; born in ere St. Gall, Switzerland ; 
professor of botany at Zurich. ‘‘ The m tinguished paleonto- 
logical botanist of our time ” [A. G.]. 
