HAMLYN'S MENAGERIE MAGAZINE. 
venience an dconfusion which it causes, is that of 
quoting the tenth edition of Linnaeus's " Systema" 
(1758) instead of the twelfth (1766) which was the 
last revised by him and published in his lifetime. 
This is a direct violation of the Code of rules for 
Zoological Nomenclature drawn up by a select 
committee of the British Association in 1842, re- 
printed in 1863 and again in 1878, and therefore 
entitled to "priority." This infringement of crin- 
ciple introduced by American ornithologists should 
never have been countenanced by the British Or- 
nithologists' Union, still less adopted as it has 
been. It is incontestable that it has caused the 
greatest confusion by the alteration of names 
which have been current in our literature for up- 
wards of a century, and have become as familiar 
as "household words." It results, moreover, 
in a manifest injustice to Linnaeus himself, who 
is thereby made responsible not only for typo- 
graphical errors, but also for names in the tenth 
edition of his great work which he corrected in 
the twelfth, the last published in his lifetime. To 
give but one instance of such injustice. In his 
tenth edition Linnaeus named the Golden Oriole 
Coracias oriolus, but subsequently in the twelfth 
edition, having discovered his mistake in regard 
to the genusl to which he assigned it, he altered 
the generic name to Oriolus, and bestowed the 
specific name galbula, and as' Oriolus, galbula this 
name has stood in all the text books from that 
time to the present day. Why then alter it to 
Oriolus oriolus in face of the statement by the 
Committ^fe of the B.O.U. that "Linnaeus almost 
invariably avoided using the same name in the 
generic and specific sense." The word "almost" I 
think might be deleted, for I can recall but one 
instance in which he involuntarilr did so>. That 
was in the case of a fish— (the mackerel) 1 — whiqh, 
by a printer's error, was at first named Scomber 
scomber; but as I pointed out twenty odd years 
ago ("Zoologist," 1894, p. 471) Linnaeus cor- 
rected this in his own handwriting to Scomber 
scombrus (a substantive in apposition) thus re- 
moving all ground for establishing a precedent. 
Yet, nowadays the new school of faddists, not 
content with repeating the generic name for what 
they call the type species, must needs repeat it a 
third time to indicate a "subspecies," and so we 
are expected to adopt such ridiculous combina- 
tions as Oriolus oriolus oriolus and Pica, pica, 
pica (asi one might call to a dog), or worse still 
Coccothraustes coccothraustes coccothraustes, 
well nigh unpronounceable. All this verbiage 
should be swept away, and a return made to the 
simplicity of the binomial system of Linnaeus, in 
accordance with the views of the practical natural- 
ists who, seventy-five years ago, established the 
Rules for Zoological Nomenclature that were sub- 
sefuently accepted by the founders of "The Ibis." 
The latter never could have foreseen such vagaries 
as have arisen at the present day. I would go 
further, and say that since experience has shown 
that nothing but confusion has resulted from the 
use of the tenth edition of Linnaeus, we are never 
likely to attain uniformity in nomenclature until 
we return to the use of the twelfth edition as re- 
vised by the author; and the longer we delay the 
correction of the mistake that has been made, the 
greater will be the confusion bequeathed to pos- 
terity. 
J. E. HARTING. 
P.S. — The concluding portion of this letter 
is omitted as being a criticism of the agenda paper 
of the meeting now over. The grievances com- 
plained of, however, remain to be dealt with, and 
it is hoped that in the interests of British Ornith- 
ology some reform may be effected. 
By a typographical error in the report of the 
meeting given in the " Field" of April 20, the name 
of the present writer was misprinted "Haw trey." 
ZOOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE : 
AN AUTHORITATIVE PROTEST. 
The following is the protest signed by in- 
fluential naturalists referred to in the foregoing 
letter : — 
"The undersigned zoologists, whilst fully 
realising the justice and utility of the rule of prior- 
ity in the choice of scientific names for animals, 
as first laid down by a Committee of the British 
Association in 1842, wish to protest against the 
abuse to which it has been put as a result of the 
most recent codes of nomenclature, and consider 
that names which have had currency for a great 
number of years should, unless preoccupied, be 
retained in the sense in which they have been 
universally used. Considering the confusion that 
must result from the strict application of the rule 
of priority, they would welcome action leading to 
the adoption of a scheme by which such names as 
have received the sanction of general usage, and 
have been invariably employed by the masters of 
zoology in the past century, would be scheduled as 
unremovable." 
(Signed) E. Ray Lankester, A. Sedgwick, P. 
Chalmers Mitchell, Sydney J. Hickson, 
R. Bowdler Sharpe, J. Arthur Thomp- 
son, Gilbert C. Bourne, E. S. Goodrich, 
J. J. Lister, W. C. Mcintosh, F. Jeffrey 
Bell, W. T. Caiman, W. E. Hoyle, A. 
M. Norman, J. Graham Kerr, Albert 
Gunther, J. Cossar Ewart, D'Arcy W. 
Thompson, Henry Woodward, E. A. 
Minchin, P. L. Sclater, W. N. Parker, 
W. J. Sollas, Edward B. Poulton, C. O. 
Waterhouse, A. Smith Woodward, Syd- 
ney F. Harmer, William Bateson, David 
Sharp, J. Stanley Gardiner, and G. A. 
Boulenger. 
