1 349-] NOMENCLATURE. 335 



longer tirade. Read my paper or not, just as you like, and 

 return it whenever you please. 



Yours most sincerely, 



C. Darwin. 



Hugh Strickland to C. Darwin. 



The Lodge, Tewkesbury, Jan. 31st, 1849. 



.... I have next to notice your second objection — that 

 retaining the name of the first describer in perpetuwn along 

 with that of the species, is a premium on hasty and careless 

 work. This is quite a different question from that of the law 

 of priority itself, and it never occurred to me before, though it 

 seems highly probable that the general recognition of that law 

 may produce such a result. We must try to conteract this 

 evil in some other way. 



The object of appending the name of a man to the name 

 of a species is not to gratify the vanity of the man, but to in- 

 dicate more precisely the species. Sometimes two men will, 

 by accident, give the same name (independently) to two spe- 

 cies of the same genus. More frequently a later author will 

 misapply the specific name of an older one. Thus the Helix 

 putris of Montagu is not H putris of Linnaeus, though Mon- 

 tague supposed it to be so. In such a case we cannot define 

 the species by Helix putris alone, but must append the name 

 of the author whom we quote. But when a species has never 

 borne but one name (as Corvus frugilegus), and no other spe- 

 cies of Corvus has borne the same name, it is, of course, un- 

 necessary to add the author's name. Yet even here I like 

 the form Corvus frugilegus, Linn., as it reminds us that this is 

 one of the old species, long known, and to be found in the 

 ' Systema Naturae,' &c. I fear, therefore, that (at least until 

 our nomenclature is more definitely settled) it will be impos- 

 sible to indicate species with scientific accuracy, without add- 

 ing the name of their first author. You may, indeed, do it as 

 you propose, by saying in Lam. An. Lnverl., &c, but then this 

 would be incompatible with the law of priority, for where 



