134 AMERICAN SPIDERS AND THEIR SPINNINGWORK. 
I spent a portion of one day in study of the figured Orbweavers alone, 
and took copious notes of those species which were entirely familiar to me. 
After my return to Philadelphia I made careful studies of Walckenaer’s 
published descriptions, comparing the same with my notes, and thereupon 
published a paper in the Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences 
of Philadelphia (1888). Therein was considered the necessity for revising 
the nomenclature of various Hentzian species of Orbweavers, of which a 
brief tabulated list was given. 
The paper caused an. animated discussion in the Academy upon the 
limits within which the law of priority should obtain, The Hentzian 
names had so long prevailed, and were so widely inwoven with 
recy °* our aranead literature, that it was held by a few that they ought 
iority. : : 
to be retained, since a change would cause embarrassment to nat- 
uralists, confusion in popular literature, and thus detriment to science. 
On the contrary, the majority present, among whom were the eminent Presi- 
dent of the Academy, the late Professor Joseph Leidy, and Professor Dall of 
Washington, held that the earlier names should in all cases be adopted, 
no matter how much inconvenience might be entailed thereby. 
This position has since received general approval. Professor T. Thorell, 
who is justly regarded as the most eminent of living” araneologists, and 
whose authority on such a point is of special value, thus wrote :! 
Approval:« ‘The discovery of Abbot’s drawings of American spiders is 
rane oe indeed a fact of the greatest interest, not only to Americans, but 
Dr. Marx, to all arachnologists, and I congratulate you on having had the 
luck to make this discovery. Of course, I have read with great 
attention what you have said on the subject. As to me, I do not entertain 
the least doubt that you and Professors Leidy, Lewis, and Dall are right, and 
that the earlier names should in all cases be adopted. The law of priority 
must be respected, and is the only one that prevents arbitrariness, and 
that gives stability to nomenclature. I think, then, that in all such cases, in 
which Walckenaer’s species can, with tolerable certainty, be recognized, 
his names should be preferred to those more lately published, even if such 
names are more commonly used, or the species better described or figured 
under the newer names.” To the approval of this most distinguished 
authority may be added that of Dr, George Marx, who, in his Catalogue 
of Described Aranez, fully accepts the conclusions, and adopts the revised 
nomenclature suggested by me. 
To this general concensus, however, there was one notable exception. Mr. 
J. H. Emerton? published a criticism upon my paper, in which 
he rejected the conclusions, and depreciated the value thereof, 
as well as of the Abbot manuscripts, which he further claimed 
to have seen in 1875, although he had never in any way made known 
Emerton 
Excepts. 
1 Proceed. Acad. Nat. Sci., Phila., 1888, page 430. 
2 Pscyche, Vol. V., No. 149-150, Sept.—Oct., 1888: Cambridge, Mass. 
