118 THE AUSTRAL AVIAN RECORD [Vol. III. 



used in the List. To particularise, they rejected the names 

 proposed in the Vroeg Catalogue as anonymous, an inaccurate 

 statement, Avhile they preferred the names given in the Ornith. 

 Brit. 1771, which they claimed to be written by Tunstall, 

 without any explanation. When we pointed out that this 

 book had no indication whatever as to its authorship they 

 ignored the matter. On p. 614, peculiarly enough, Richmond 

 has omitted the name, so it is necessary to emphasize its 

 validity. — Philomachus pugnax. 



Plautus. 



This name, as of Brunnich, 1771, was commonly used for 

 the Great Auk, but in the B.O.U. List this species was regarded 

 as congeneric with the Razor Bill, a degradation of characters 

 which could not be defended save by such arguments as would 

 make genera quite unnecessary at all. Richmond has. accepted 

 the introduction of this name by Gunnerus in 1761, when it was 

 associated with the Little Auk, a species considered generally 

 separable under the later name Alle Link, 1807, and it claims 

 usage, if at all, in this connection. The generic name to be 

 applied to the Great Auk is a perplexing problem. Bonnaterre, 

 in the Tabl. Ency. Meth. Orn., Vol. I., pp. lxxxiii. and 28, 1791, 

 proposed Pinguinus, with impennis as the first species, and the 

 name was cited as a synonym of Alca and Chenalopex by 

 Gray, with that species as type. There is, however, a prior 

 Penguinus of Brunnich for a very different group, and the 

 two words may be considered as separate names, as they 

 certainly have a directly different source of formation, though 

 of common origin. Thus Pinguinus is a latinizatio.n of .the 

 French name of these birds, while Penguinus is a rendering of 

 the English name Penguin applied to a different series, though 

 from the same initiative. As the genus Plautus was accepted 

 by the American Ornithologists' Union Check List, 3rd ed., 

 1910, it will be interesting to see their decision. After this 

 name comes Chenalopex. Richmond cites this as of Dumont 

 (Diet. Soc. Nat., Vol. 8, 1817, p. 393), but when we worked 

 through that publication we did not consider the name 



