Juxy 2, 1897.] 
too slovenly to spell them properly, sinned 
in the beginning. We are opposed to 
‘original sin,’ whether as a theological 
dogma or a canon of nomenclature. On 
this subject we cite from a private letter 
lately addressed to us by one of the most 
learned and distinguished of American 
philologists, Professor C. P. G. Scott : 
“J think you are quite right, as a scholar, 
in your disapproval of the mechanical rule 
which, as a member of a committee con- 
strained to compromise, you passively sanc- 
tioned in 1886. It seems to me that these 
verbal uncertainties will never end, no mat- 
ter what committees may recommend or do. 
Therefore, since the only purpose of com- 
promise is to end uncertainties and dis- 
erepancies, it would be better for your com- 
mittee to revise the code of nomenclature 
with reference to etymologic principles 
which can be ascertained and stated, and to 
consider all material deviations, intended 
or unintended, old or new, as if misprints 
to be corrected in subsequeut works. Ety- 
mologie principles are a good deal more 
stable and visible than is commonly sup- 
posed ; but you know by long observation 
that not every zoologist (particularly in 
France) is sound in his tackling of Greek 
and Latin.” 
Our zeal for ‘spelling reform’ might not 
now lead us to the length it did, for ex- 
ample, when we emended Richardson’s 
genus Aplodontia into Haplodon, only to find, 
to our dismay, that in its new guise the 
name was homonymous with several others 
of prior date, and therefore inadmissible 
for the genus ofmammals. We would treat 
such a case as incorrigible, and let it go at 
that, without regard to its etymology. It 
seems to us that tact, discretion and com- 
mon sense, applied to each individual case, 
is likely to work better than any rigid rule 
which could be devised to cover all cases. 
We are not such rigid purists as to sacrifice 
the Law of Priority to purism. In fact, we 
SCIENCE. 13 
would not go to the length Lord Walsing- 
ham does in‘ 33 e.g. (2),’ where he ‘corrects’ 
eretidactylus into gypsodactylus. If both these 
names mean ‘ chalk-toe,’ as we suppose, the 
substitution of gypsum for chalk, to prevent 
a Greeco-Latin hybrid, seems hardly re- 
quired. That is mere purism, only less un- 
objectionable than the systematic impurism 
which the A. O. U. Code would force upon 
us. A certain ‘ sweet reasonableness’ would 
seem to be the best prophylactic or preven- 
tive—hbetter than extreme measures either 
way. Such heroic treatment is likely to 
become the mock heroism of opera bouffe. 
As Horace said, some years ago: 
“Fst modus in rebus ; sunt certi denique fines, 
Ultra citraque nequit consistere rectum ;’’ 
and as Professor B. G. Wilder lately re- 
marked, in the course of his controversy 
with Wilhelm His : 
“As with biologic generalizations, there 
are few philological rules without excep- 
tions. Yet the reformer, especially if young 
and enthusiastic, either ignorant of history 
or undismayed thereby, ‘too often imagines 
that a principle, if right, cannot be carried 
too far.’”” ( Barclay, 1803.) 
Our A. O. U. committee may be neither 
very young nor over-enthusiastic ; yet this 
is precisely what we have done to the ex- 
cellent principle of priority—carried it too 
far, in attempting to impose verbal abor- 
tions upon nomenclature. The results 
sometimes better befit the nursery in their 
puerility than the halls of science. Take 
that miserable botch of a word Leptotila 
Swainson for a genus of pigeons. If the 
celebrated quinarian had printed Leptoptila, 
in proper form, his genus would have been 
invalidated by the prior Leptoptilos or Lep- 
toptilus for a genus of storks, because by our 
rules a difference of termination in words 
etymologically identical does not prevent 
homonymity ; but because Swainson or his 
printer did not mind his p’s—whatever he 
