in diagnosing forms, whereby species have been thought 

 to be distinct which are really alike, owing for instance 

 to a misapprehension of a minor variation either in 

 colour (due merely to differing degrees of intensity), in 

 size, in habitat (e. g. lake and marine perch), or in 

 spawning-time, etc., he lays special stress on the need 

 for accuracy and discrimination; such slight variations 

 do not give rise to the establishing of new Species, but 

 only to "Varieties". 



Just as Artedi, after defining what was to be under- 

 stood by genus, subjected genus-names to a severe scru- 

 tiny, so now, when he has discussed species in general, 

 he goes on to examine critically the names in use for 

 them. "A species-name", he says, a is the epithet, con- 

 sisting of some few words, which is appended to the 

 genus-name, in order to distinguish one fish species from 

 the others in the same genus". These epithets must be 

 effective for the function they are thus required to per- 

 form; if they only state the more or less general oc- 

 currence of the species, its assumed sequence in the 

 genus, home, mode of occurrence, size, varying colour 

 or markings, etc., they are, as being of no use to the 

 reader, spurious and repudiable. Genuine species-names, 

 on the other hand, are those which serve to mark off 

 at a glance, or with a minimum of effort, one species 

 from the others in the same genus. They must, in 

 other words, state such genuine species-characters as 

 have been mentioned in the foregoing. 



In having solved the question of genus-names so 

 excellently, by enunciating such clear and definite rules 

 for their use, Artedi was on the very threshold of a com- 

 plete solution of the nomenclature problem ; there would 

 seem to have been but one simple step for him to take, 

 to arrive at the law of binomenclature; however, in 

 treating species-names he drifted away from the right 

 track, owing to the exacting demands he made upon 

 them. Genus-designations, or generic names, he trans- 

 formed into real names, but in dealing with species 

 names he confused the two ideas of name and diagnosis; 



