96 Dr. A. Giinther on a new Species 



Pera^ having been obtained in the month of December, by Mr. 

 Thomas Robson, near the village of Havancore, where the species 

 is common in wooded districts ; it does not differ from the Eu- 

 ropean species in its habits. Parus major, P. palustris, P. ater, 

 and P. cceruleus inhabit the same localities, without perceptible 

 difference from the European birds. 



The generic name of Orites was established by Mohring, 

 in his work entitled 'Avium Genera^ (Auricse, 1752, 8vo), 

 and was afterwards adopted by Mr. G. H. Gray. The opinion 

 that all genera, even those which have been properly named and 

 well characterized by authors writing before the years of publi- 

 cation of the 10th or 12th edition of Linne's ' Systema Naturae,' 

 should be ignored and indiscriminately cancelled, appears to me 

 to involve an act of great injustice towards the contemporaries of 

 Linnaeus. The idea oi genera had been formed before Linnaeus ; 

 and although he attached a definite value to genera, and gave 

 them a systematic character by means of exact definitions, he 

 has to share this merit with others. No one will deny that the 

 foundation of our ichthyological system had been laid by Artedi, 

 whose ' Genera Piscium ' had been finished before the year 1735, 

 but, owing to the premature death of the author, were not pub- 

 lished before 1 738, and passed into the ' Systema Naturae,' without 

 receiving a systematic character beyond that which had been 

 given in the previous work. 



In the same way Mohring's little work appears to me to 

 be fully entitled to recognition on the part of ornithologists ; 

 and the names proposed by him ought to be used, at least in 

 such cases as the present, where the generally adopted nomen- 

 clature can be altered without material inconvenience or any 

 risk of confusion. One feels surprised to find at so early a 

 period of zoological science such a systematic dexterity as is 

 displayed by that author ; and as regards the systematic cha- 

 racter of his genera, they are at least as exactly defined by 

 name, as well as by diagnosis, as those of the ' Systema Naturae.' 

 Thus, for instance, Parus and Orites, two genera of his " ordo 

 Passeres," are characterized in the following terms (p. 45) : — 



" Parus, Linn. Rostrum subulatum, i-ectum, superficie versus 

 apicem parum descendente. Nares plumis frontalibus 



