Birds. 2725 



such a rule is necessary in Botany, it must at least be equally called 

 for in the kindred science of Zoology ; and it is conceived that it may 

 be extended, with the most beneficial results, to species as well 

 as to genera. It is presumed to be the belief of naturalists, with but 

 inconsiderable exceptions, that, in no branch of the kingdom of 

 Nature, has the creation of an additional animal or plant taken place 

 since the moment when our first parents were called into existence ; 

 and if this is the case, none of the animals which have been described 

 and arranged by naturalists can, logically speaking, be considered as 

 having in themselves a superiority, either in importance or in time, 

 from the mere circumstance that ages may have elapsed between the 

 discovery by man of the first species belonging to any particular genus 

 and the discovery of another species which may have been added to 

 the same genus only the other day. In reference to man, indeed, they 

 may be looked upon as being of different dates ; and those of them 

 which have been most recently brought to light, may be viewed by 

 him as subordinate to those of which he may have long had the know- 

 ledge, and with the habits of which he may be familiarly acquainted : 

 but in a philosophical sense this cannot be admitted ; and each must 

 be regarded as individually constituting a distinct and independent 

 species from the period when the whole were simultaneously formed 

 and appointed by their Creator to constitute that genus in the system 

 of Nature which combines more characters, possessed in common by 

 them all, than are to be found in any other group throughout the ani- 

 mal kingdom. And it is this very circumstance that would appear to 

 furnish a strong and an abiding objection against all names in Natural 

 History which end in oides. One animal ought not to be deprived of 

 a distinct and independent name, and to be characterized as only re- 

 sembling another animal, merely because the latter has accidentally 

 come to the knowledge of man, and has had its habits investigated at 

 perhaps a much more early period than the former : in the eye of 

 Reason they are both coeval, and independent the one of the other. 



In the Reports on Ornithology to which I refer, and which are two 

 in number, we meet with a great many specific names which have 

 their termination in oides. A few of these may be enumerated, as, for 

 instance, Emberiza Cioides, or the bunting having a resemblance to 

 the Cia bunting (p. 66) ; Saxicola Leucoroides, or the stone-frequenter 

 or chat resembling the white-tail, but not necessarily meaning — if we 

 regard merely the component parts of leucoroides — that it is the 

 white-tail chat, although it is wished, and doubtless expected, that on 

 the part of the reader that circumstance should be taken as a matter 

 VIII N 



