ornithologist's text-book. 225 



English name that corresponds to Fringilla f 

 " Grosbeak" corresponds to Coccothraustes, u Lin- 

 net" to Linota, and so on, but there is nothing in 

 English answering to Fringilla ; while in the 

 genus Passer, the name " Sparrow" — which is 

 equivalent to Passer — is given. In order to have 

 made the English and Latin designations agree, 

 they should have been as follows : — Haw Gros- 

 beak Finch, Common Linnet Finch, Goldwinged 

 Siskin Finch, Whitewinged Chaff' Finch*, &c. 

 But this method is so clumsy and inconvenient, 

 that, though the subgeneric system possesses some 

 advantages, yet it could, on this account, scarcely 

 answer the practical purposes of science. And 

 then, others might institute sub-subge?iera, alleging 

 that in some cases, the distinctive marks are not 

 sufficiently evident to warrant even a subgeneric 

 division. The Linaria cannabina and L. pasilla 

 might be taken as an instance of this. I think it 

 will be found, in the end, that generic divisions 

 are quite sufficient, without establishing any groups 

 of lower value. Be this, however, as it may, what 

 I wish to contend for is, that the English names 

 should correspond to the Latin ones. 



As yet, no book has appeared which may be in- 

 variably relied on and confidently referred to as a 

 guide to English nomenclature, either in theory or 

 practice. With regard to the water birds, Selby 

 has succeeded tolerably well in giving to each 

 genus an English name, but in the land birds — 

 which are more apt to receive popular and erro- 

 neous designations — he has entirely failed. The 

 various members of the Sylviadce, he indiscrimi- 

 nately terms Chats, Redstarts, Warblers, Wrens, 

 &c, without the slightest regard to generic divi- 



* Had Mr. Blyth written Chaff Finch as two words, instead of 

 one, his Englsh names of this subgenus had been right. 



