16 
blessed with such a thing as an infallible 
rule of faith and morals in matters of nomen- 
clature that state of beatitude may be 
sought along the line of one of Lord Wal- 
singham’s suggestions: “ All branches of 
zoological study should undoubtedly be 
represented on any committee entrusted 
with the task of drawing up rules for gen- 
eral guidance.”’ Pending any final consum- 
mation, British ornithologists will no doubt 
continue to lean upon Strickland and the 
B. A. Code. American ornithologists, and 
most zoologists of this country, will stand 
by the A. O. U. Code ; while doubtless the 
Merton Rules will be respected by most of 
those entomologists whose requirements are 
so ably met in this instance. 
ExioTr Cougs. 
As said above, the ‘ Merton Rules’ agree 
in the main, or at least on most points of 
leading importance, with other recently 
promulgated Codes of Nomenclature ; but 
they embrace many provisions, by no means 
all new, which are open to strenuous 
objection, on the ground that they seriously 
militate against the stability of names in 
zoology. Some of these have been pointed 
out in the foregoing review; others have been 
passed over leniently or quite unnoticed. 
On the other hand, some which we con- 
sider utterly objectionable have received 
approval. 
Rule 5, for example, provides that ‘‘ The 
same name may be used once only in the 
same grade, with the exception of special 
[specific] names, so long as they occur in 
different genera, and of subspecial [sub- 
specific] names so long as they are subser- 
vient to different species.” Since ‘sub- 
special,’ or subspecific, names are often ap- 
plied to forms of uncertain status, and may 
be regarded either as species or subspecies 
by different writers, it is obvious that they 
should fall under the same rule as ‘ special,’ 
or specific, names. Otherwise they are open 
SCIENCE. 
LN. S. Vou. VI. No. 131. 
to instability, according to whether the 
forms to which they may be applied may be 
regarded as ‘species’ or ‘subspecies’ by dif- 
ferent authors. 
Rule 19 divides ‘invalid names, consid- 
ered merely as words,’ into three classes: 
(1) Homonymous, (2) Homophonous, and (3) 
Synonymous. ‘Homophonous’ words are 
‘words differently written, but indistin- 
guishable in sound, applied to different con- 
ceptions.’ 
Rule 20 provides that ‘‘ A name homoph- 
onous with a valid name is invalid, in ac- 
cordance with the rule governing homon- 
omy (Rule 5).” (See Rule 5, as quoted 
above.) This we regard as a pernicious in- 
innovation. Previous codes advise that in 
selecting new (especially generic) names 
those closely resembling previous names in 
orthography or sound be avoided; but this 
is the first instance, we believe, where they 
have been declared invalid. The objections 
to this rule are: (1) that scientific nomen- 
clature belongs properly to written lan- 
guage, not to spoken language; (2) that 
whether a name is or is not too near in 
sound, when properly pronounced, to an- 
other earlier name must be largely a matter 
of opinion. respecting which authors must 
frequently disagree ; this disagreement be- 
ing necessarily a fruitful source of instabil- 
ity in names. It opens a loophole for the 
displacement of well-known names by new 
ones on the ground of personal opinion or 
preference, perhaps biased by the opportu- 
nities thus presented. In all languages there 
are almost innumerable homophonous words 
of radically different origin and meaning; 
why should they not be admissible in the 
language of science ? 
Rule 20 is thus in opposition to the intent 
of nearly all modern codes, which are 
designed to leave as little as possible open 
to the notoriously unsafe decision of per- 
sonal judgment or option in matters of no- 
menclature. 
