182 



[Dumber, 



the Greek word which he professed to be Latinizing. The unfortunate similarity, 

 in many founts of type, of the diphthongs ce and oe leads to constant confusion. 

 And nomeuclators occasionally forget that the Greek ai is represented in Latin by 

 the dipthong ce, and the Greek oi by 02 ; thus we have Oinophila where we ought 

 to have (Enophila. Mistakes like these ought, in my opinion, to be rectified. And 

 it may be worth while to add that I regard it as perfectly proper to cite Argyrotoxa 

 and (Enophila of Stephens. 



(3) Mistakes in the spelling of proper names are not uncommon — sometimes 

 the printer, sometimes the author himself, is at fault. Example, Stiymodera Yarelli, 

 Lap. and Gory, for Tatrellii. In a note at p. 32 of Trans. Ent. Soc, 1868, I have 

 sufficiently indicated my opinion as to the retention of blunders like this. 



(4) But some Medes and Persians are so enamoured of the " law of priority " 

 that they will not even permit an author to correct his own mistakes. It is only 

 on this hypothesis that the retention of Psocus can be supported ; since Latreille, 

 who published Psocus in 1794, himself gave the correct form PsocJms in 1796. 

 Here, again, I should like to ask what must have been done if the printer, 

 instead of dropping out the h, had omitted (say) the 0, thereby reducing the name 

 to Pschus ? Must Latreille, and all the world besides, have for ever continued to 

 sputter over the genus Pschus ? 



(5) " Lastly (says Mr. Marshall) a vicious practice has been imported from the 

 Continent, and is daily gaining ground. It is that of making genera which end in 

 -TOMA, -OMA, or -SOMA, neuter, instead of feminine. This extraordinary and illogical 

 vagary seems founded on some confused notion that all Greek words ending in 

 -DMA must be neuter because soma is so. It seems necessary to point out that 

 the gender of the diflFerent nouns forming a compound can have no influence on 

 the gender of the compound when formed. The latter depends for gender on its 

 own termination, and nothing more. [And is moreover supposed to bo Latin, 

 whatever its derivation. — Eds.] Acanthosoma is feminine by the form of the 

 word, irrespective of the gender of Acantha or Soma ; to make it neuter is to mis- 

 understand the use of words. It would not be more ludicrous to argue that a 

 carriage must be feminine, because it has a lady inside. Nevertheless a German 

 iUuminato has gravely propounded this rule, and by way of correction, as a legitimate 

 principle in nomenclature." (Ent. Mo. Mag. iv, p. 260). 



En passant f the neutrification of Acanthosoma has nothing to do with " bad 

 spelling." 



I may observe that in the aforesaid " Accentuated List " we did not alter, 

 from feminine to neuter, the gender of such generic names as these, but retained 

 Di/plodoi^ia marginipunctella, Dasystoma salicella, Homoeosoma nehulella, &c. On the 

 other hand, in the 3rd series of the Trans. Ent. Soc, there are many such forms 

 treated as of the neuter gender, and I have not attempted to induce the 

 authors to make them feminine. Hitherto, then, I have been indifferent on the 

 point, or perhaps I ought to say, passively, if not actively, inconsistent. But now 

 that the question has been so pointedly raised by Mr. Marshall, I feel compelled to 

 throw off my indifference, and range myself on one side or the other. 



The question does not appear to me so simple as Mr. Marshall seems to think ; 

 and though I can quite understand my friend's view, I see nothing ludicrous in 

 that of the " German illuminato." I should like to hear the said German argue 

 the point ; failing that, I will (for the sake of ventilating the subject) try to place 

 myself in his position. 



