85 | [Vol. xl. 
original species, and I am sure my difficulties must have been 
those of many other youngsters also. It was Dr. Hartert 
in a little note on the Minivets who first put me on the 
right trail, and from that moment my difficulties practically 
disappeared, and I found in trinomialism the solution of all 
my difficulties. 
In foreign countries, and especially in tropical areas, 
where most collecting is carried out in winter, it is often 
most perplexing when one has to deal with both breeding 
and migratory individuals of the same species, and here the 
field-naturalist alone can help us out of our difficulties, and 
thé material obtained by oologists in the way of breeding- 
birds is of incomparable value. Take, for instance, our 
Little Ringed Plovers. We have breeding races in areas 
ranging from W. Europe to Japan, but in winter all three 
races are found within the Indian Empire. Again, the 
Kentish Plover is a similar instance. We have alexandrinus 
breeding from England to Quetta (Meinertzhagen), de- 
albatus breeding in China, ete., and seebohmi breeding in 
India and Ceylon, and all three are found in India in winter. 
To the cologist also the interest of geographical races is 
quite as fascinating as to the purely bird man, though so far 
the effect of environment has been much neglected in oology, 
and we really know practically nothing about it, yet in 
many instances eggs vary geographically, even more than 
the birds which lay them. 
I have never been able to fathom the reasons of those who 
inveigh against trinomialism. As a rule, it is merely the 
allegation that we are making it harder for the individual in 
question to remember names. So, too, those who curse the 
modern ornithologist for creating—as they call it—new 
names, generally found their reasons for the accusation on 
the inconvenience it causes them personally. 
There can be but one correct name for a bird, and naturalists 
of the calibre who complain because their personal con- 
venience and sympathies are not consulted forget that no 
generation works for itself alone and its own pleasure. It 
is the duty of each generation to put classification and nomen- 
