PREFACE. Xlll 



the later months of the year. In the August number I reprinted a 

 document on this subject which had been issued with the signatures 

 of nine of our entomologists, and had been extensively circulated : I 

 attached to the reprint (Zool. 2549) a brief observation of my own. 

 The matter was discussed at greater length, and my remark criticised 

 with more seriousness than it required, in a paper read by Mr. Stain- 

 ton before the Entomological Society, on the 3rd of September, and 

 reported in extenso in the October number (Zool. 2579). In this 

 paper, the principal point advocated by Mr. Stainton is the absolute 

 authority of the law of priority, irrespective of casual error, inadvertent 

 reiteration, or want of uniformity in termination. Taking an exactly 

 opposite view of this absolute authority of a law, the authors of the 

 admirable catalogue of Oxfordshire Birds actually change the ear- 

 liest published name of a bird, because they consider a subsequently 

 published name more appropriate (Zool. 2599).* The right path 

 appears to me to lie between the absolute restriction and the unfettered 

 license. As to the uniformity of termination in certain groups of 

 Lepidoptera, it was a classical and elegant design on the part of the 

 great founder of scientific nomenclature, and the carrying out of this 

 design by the disciples of Linneus is a tribute to his merit as graceful 

 as it is just. It seems to me that there are certain prescriptive laws 

 of nomenclature by which the majority are willing to abide, and that 

 all attempts to improve them fail in their object : this is not a matter 

 of necessity, but a very probable consequence, since the prescriptive 

 laws result from the collective wisdom of naturalists during three 

 quarters of a century ; the modified printed laws generally emanate 

 from a single individual, to whom the subject is comparatively new, 

 and to whom certain unavoidable difficulties and contradictions in 



* This change appears to me objectionable on a second ground : the name se- 

 lected (Andalusica) conveys an erroneous idea, the bird being common to Europe, 

 Asia and Africa, and, although met with in Andalusia, being a rarity in that pro- 

 vince ; and I learn from good authority that its sojourn in the open country is excep- 

 tional, or perhaps more properly seasonal : no error would therefore be propagated 

 by the earlier, while an error is propagated by the later name. I merely notice this 

 as exhibiting the danger of assuming the right of selecting, since scarcely two natu- 

 ralists will agree in the selection. 



