144 ON BIRDS' NAMES. 



ON BIRDS' NAMES. 



BY WM. G. PRAEGER, KEOKUK, IOWA. 



Ornithologists can never be accused of having neglected 

 the scientific names of birds. The majority of our text-books 

 commence each article with a long list of so-called Latin 

 names, each one followed by references quite untelligible 

 to the average citizen. Many of our museums exhibit rows 

 of mounted specimens, to each one of v/hich is attached a 

 label with a scientific name in large type, while it may or 

 may not give a few other particulars. The beginner whose 

 interest has been aroused by watching the birds themselves 

 from day to day, when he inquires further into the science, 

 is brought face to face with these terrible words, and is 

 often convinced that a mastery of scientific names is the 

 first step toward the desired knowledge. Becoming dis- 

 couraged when he sees so much dull practising of the scales 

 and five-finger exercises before him, he eschews all text- 

 books, continues perhaps to watch birds with a rather hope- 

 less pleasure, and dies still wishing he knew something of 

 ornithology. 



While I believe that Latin names are a scarecrow to some 

 and that, on the other hand, many forget that " nomenclature 

 is a means, not a end," yet I do not undervalue their im- 

 portance. Dried skins with dried names attached are in- 

 dispensable to science ; the more of them we have the 

 better. The skins of dead birds, at times mounted to simu- 

 late life, and the words of a dead language, revitalized by 

 our rules of nomenclature, have much to teach us. But I 

 contend that for many of the broadest, highest and best 



