MELVILL: THE PRINCIPLES OF NOMENCLATURE. 463 
Rule 21. 
(/) Sub-species and other deviations from the type, and 
also constant local forms and varieties requiring special names, 
should have them placed after the specific name. 
It was the publication of these rules that caused Mr. 
P. L. Sclater, F.R.S., the Secretary of the Zoological Society 
of London, in the spring of this year (1896), to introduce the 
subject and invite a discussion, at which those proposed clauses 
which sought to revise and alter certain existing rules of the 
Stricklandian Code were especially criticised. 
These rules* were mainly framed with a view to aid the 
compilers of the gigantic synopsis of the animal kingdom now 
being entered upon by German specialists, about which I shall 
shortly say a few words, and the chief points raised, as seeking 
to subvert the existing laws, were 
(a) May Zoological names be, in certain cases identical 
with those employed in Botany or not ? 
(6) May the same term be used for the generic and 
specific name of any individual ? 
(c) Is the tenth (or twelfth) edition of the ‘‘ Systema 
Nature” of Linnzeus to be employed as a starting point of all 
Nomenclature in Zoology ? 
After a prolonged discussion in which Sir William Flower, 
Prof. Ray Lankester, Mr. Elwes, Dr. Sharp, Mr. W. T. Blan- 
ford, Messrs. Forbes, Kirby, and others addressed the meeting, 
although no formal resolution was adopted, it appeared that the 
general feeling of the meeting was on the whole not adverse to 
the proposed changes. 
With regard to (a), the new rule is, in my opinion, an 
equitable one, and its being passed as law would save much 
unnecessary change. 
As regards Malacology, however, it would not signify 
very much whether the terms used in Botany be allowed or not. 
* Regeln fiir die wissenschaftliche Benennung der Thiere zusammengestellt yon der 
Deutschen Zoologischen Gesellschaft, Leipzig, 1894. 
