14 LEAFLETS. 



The Logic of It. 



At page 142 of the Third Volume of Torreya one reada a 

 sort of diatribe against a man in Italy who has lately not only 

 perpetrated some duplicate binary names in zoology, but also 

 shovn himself unaware of the circumstance that such a thing 

 had been done before. 



I have no sympathy with narrow provinciality and ignorance 

 — though it occurs in many places outside of Italy — and I quite 

 enjoy the keen rebuke administered to that malacographer, and 

 to some other people nearer home, by the writer in Torreya. 

 At the same time I wonder why the critic did not take his mala- 

 cologist to task for another piece of innocency which, if less 

 ridiculous, is more dangerous. I refer to his assertion, as quoted 

 by the critic, that these duplicate names result from his having 

 retained the " original Linnaean names for the species, though 

 these may have been chosen to denote the genus." The man evi- 

 dently thinks that these appellations which he has been doubling 

 up came into existence there in the margins of the Linnaean 

 pages as species names, and were afterwards placed in the rank 

 of generic names ; while the fact is that not one such name is 

 original with Linnseus. They all existed as genus names before 

 Linneeus. 



Now such an inversion of history as this Mediterranean mala- 

 cologist makes in calling them " original Linnaean names " seemi 

 to me the really reprehensible fault in this paper as quoted. 

 Why is this expression of a palpable untruth allowed to pass 

 unscathed? Is it perchance needful in order to secure currency 

 for these Cat cat. Dog dog, names, that one should try to keep 

 alive the moribund faith in that mythical Linnaeus in whom our 

 forefathers believed, who was supposed to have been the origi- 

 nal author and promulgator of a scientific nomenclature for 

 groups of living entities ? Is some survival of this myth to ac- 

 count for the critic's silence as to this error ? 



Some dozen years ago, I was told by an aged gentleman that his 

 father, a New York naturalist at the beginning of the nineteenth 



