SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



his being a man of vast resource and quick 

 perception, and in many most difficult cases 

 he was always ready to help those around him 

 out of what frequently appeared to be an almost 

 hopeless position. Naturally of a most amiable 

 temperament, Mr. Bartlett was ever kind to all 

 classes of society with whom he came in contact, 

 but at the same time he was of a retiring nature. 

 Few men were better known or respected than 



Mr. Bartlett, and his long association with the Zoo 

 made him a favourite with succeeding generations 

 of delighted visitors, to whom he would often, in 

 spite of his many duties, find time to tell quaint 

 facts and anecdotes about his animals, which long 

 lived in the memories of the visitors. He died in 

 his eighty-fifth year, on May 7th, after a long and 

 painful illness, and rests in the family grave in 

 Highgate cemetery. 



THE CONFUSION IN NOMENCLATURE. 

 By W. H. Nunney. 



'npHE publication in the recent pages of 

 ■*■ Science-Gossip of notes on this important 

 subject, as well as of an epitome of the code of 

 zoological nomenclature compiled by the German 

 Zoological Society, which appeared in "Nature" of 

 the 5th March, 1896, and the issue, in November 

 last, of Lord Walsingham's and Mr. Hartley 

 Durrant's " Merton Rules," will have attracted 

 the attention of naturalists. A few additional 

 thoughts on this subject, with a view to render- 

 ing the confusion somewhat less, may not be 

 ill-timed. 



These sets of rules necessarily differ, but in the 

 main may be said to be based on the Stricklandian 

 code which has done such excellent service, the 

 German code being somewhat the more concise. 

 It is, however, hardly requisite to publish the sets 

 side by side. 



Both the "Merton" and the German rules 

 are restricted in their use to purely zoological 

 nomenclature, whilst the Stricklandian deals also 

 with botany. The latter assumes that a name 

 should be utilised once only in any department, 

 and that it shall not occur in both botany 

 and zoology. With this I practically agree. 

 Unfortunately, however, the dual use is in 

 vogue. It may, nevertheless, be said that 

 under the existing and probably increased future 

 conditions of forced specialism it must be very 

 evident that the average zoologist, for instance, has 

 quite enough to do to gather and retain knowledge 

 relative to his own subject, without being able, if 

 desirous, of giving sufficient attention to botanical 

 matters to enable him to steer clear of clashings 

 in that connection. Under the Stricklandian code 

 and the law of priority, much, in my opinion, 

 needless labour is forced upon the describer of 

 species and the creator of fresh divisions. Few 

 zoologists are acquainted with zoological and 

 botanical nomenclature ; the botanists' wish to retain 

 a name familiar to them must also be considered. 

 The advancement of science is of course retarded 

 by the ensuing altercation as to the questions of 

 familiar use, priority, etc. I myself fail to see why 



the contemporaneous use of one name in two such 

 great divisions of nature should not be allowed ; 

 as, for instance, Corydalis, occurring in both 

 entomology and botany, as a matter of fact could 

 not lead to confusion. Granted the same root- 

 word, a varying termination would surmount the 

 difficulty. 



It has indeed occurred to me that perhaps the 

 very best thing that could happen would be the 

 introduction of a kind of scientific Volapiik, or 

 arbitrary means of manipulating the terminations 

 of all the words of the greater divisions of each 

 class, so that by first of all having committed to 

 memory the whole number of terminations, one 

 could, upon becoming acquainted with a word new 

 to one's vocabulary, tell by its final consonant or 

 vowel to what main and (if the principle were 

 carried far enough) even perhaps to what sub- 

 group the corresponding species belonged. Such 

 terminations might at first be looked upon as 

 somewhat uncouth, but would, I am inclined to 

 think, prove a vast advance upon the present 

 loose system of like endings in many groups of all 

 grades, as formerly used by lepidopterists. 



In considering zoology alone, and in the depart- 

 ment of entomology, I would group the generic 

 names somewhat as follows : coleoptera, all names 

 ending in the letter "a," thus, Etnusa. hirtus, 

 Staphylinusa. c&sar; in neuroptera, the vowel "e," 

 Sialise fertugtnea, and so forth. This would hardly, 

 I think, clash with rule 4 of the German code, to 

 the effect that names differing only orthographically 

 be considered identical, and I publish the idea 

 for what it is worth. Under this rule, and consider- 

 ing odonata, the use of the words JEschna and 

 Mshini, for instance (see Mr. W. F. Kirby's 

 "Catalogue of Odonata"), must be discounte- 

 nanced, and I think rightly, especially as the 

 first of these names should strictly, with regard 

 to the law of priority and the theory of types, be 

 deleted. 



The law of priority, the main principle of all the 

 codes quoted, is, as has often been remarked, by 

 no means an unmixed blessing, though by its aid 



