10 
liarly or exclusively adapted to the exigen- 
cies of entomological work it is of course 
not within the purview of ornithology ; but 
its most avowed object of insisting upon the 
Law of Priority, its whole tenor, and most 
of its fifty-one canons, are no more perti- 
nent to one branch of zoology than to any 
other. Lord Walsingham and his secretary 
thus submit a set of rules to the considera- 
tion of all zoologists, and no apology is 
needed for examining them with special 
reference to the A. O. U. Code. 
Naturalists are in substantial agreement 
upon such a large majority of the proposi- 
tions which bear upon the ‘highly-con- 
tentious’ subject of Nomenclature that we 
should expect any code drawn up by com- 
petent workers to be good in the main. 
Such is emphatically the case in the present 
instance. If, therefore, we seem to dwell 
upon the exceptions we take, to an extent 
disproportionate with the commendation 
we give, it will be understood that the 
latter goes without saying. Probably four- 
fifths of these rules will receive general un- 
qualified assent ; it is mainly regarding the 
remainder that we have here todo. Most 
of these may be reasonably questioned, and 
some of them are likely to be regarded as 
highly objectionable. 
We think that the authors make a strong 
point in the introduction, but it is made so 
quietly that its full force may not be recog- 
nized at first sight. This is where (p. 4), 
referring to other codes, the authors say 
they ‘are not aware that in any of these 
rules the actual work and intention of an 
author has been guarded to the same extent 
as the names which he has given to his con- 
ceptions,” andthen add: “It has been one of 
our objects to define a method by which the 
recognition of antecedent work can be con- 
sistently secured, regarding this also as no 
less a moral obligation capable of being met 
by the same rules which apply to mere 
names.” 
SCIENCE. 
[N. S. Von. VI. No. 131. 
This raises a large question, concerning 
which we are heartily on the side of the 
authors. We have too often heard it said 
that, as we cannot enter into the inner 
consciousness of another, especially if he 
have lived in other times and been long 
dead, we have no concern with his spirit, 
purpose or intents, but only with his acts, 
and that consequently we must go by what 
he actually did, without regard to what we 
may think he intended to do. We believe 
this to be bad—unjust and dangerous ; Lord 
Walsingham has the right of it in intro- 
ducing something of a moral or ethical 
principle, difficult as such may be of appli- 
cation in all cases. An author’s intent or 
purpose can generally be fairly presumed or 
inferred from his writings ; when such pre- 
sumption or inference is reasonable it surely 
should not be disregarded, and the cases 
must be very few in which no meaning is 
discoverable. 
Example: In founding his genus Dendra- 
gapus Mr. Elliot intended to separate grouse 
of the obscurus group from those of the can- 
adensis type. That was the sole intent, pur- 
pose, scope and function of his generic 
name. What right, then, has any subse- 
quent author to use Dendragapus for the 
sole purpose of uniting obscurus with cana- 
densis? None; such a travesty of the gen- 
eric name, such a perversion, or rather re- 
versal, of Mr. Elliot’s express purpose, is 
simply nomenclatural hocus-pocus, and as 
such it is puerile, unscientific and immoral. 
There is another point in Lord Walsing- 
ham’s introduction we must pause to ap- 
plaud heartily. Though it be one of those 
which, as we say above, go without saying, 
it is particularly well said (p. 5): ‘The 
object of all rules should surely be to se- 
cure precision, uniformity, and finality : any 
sacrifice of these objects to considerations of 
mere convenience can only result in the cre- 
ation of greater inconvenience at some 
future date. The inconveniences from which 
