I893-] THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 



believed the statements he was making to be accurate ; the whole 

 gist of my complaint against him was that he did not, before publish- 

 ing them, subject them to that rigid verification which the exigencies 

 of scientific discussion demand. 



The justice of this complaint is abundantly demonstrated by Mr. 

 Dale's replies. He explicitly admits his error in regard to edusa, Fb., 

 1776, passes over sub-silentio a great many of my other points, and 

 proves the truth of my contention up to the — shall I say— broom- 

 handle (seep. 162) by his constant reference to magazine articles as 

 the authority for his statements. 



Mr. Dale is not yet convinced that he is wrong about the British 

 Association rule. In the official " Report of the Twelfth Meeting of 

 the British Association held at Manchester in June, 1842," at p. no, 

 I find these words :— " We therefore recommend the adoption of the 

 following proposition : 2. The binomial nomenclature having origi- 

 nated with Linnaeus, the law of priority in respect of that nomenclature 

 is not to extend to the writings of antecedent authors." Where is the 

 reference to the 12th edition of " Systema Naturae " ? 



Mr. Dale also refuses to admit, that to quote a statement from an 

 author's text, without at the same time pointing out that the author 

 corrected it in his " corrigenda," is to misquote him. Would not Mr. 

 Dale say that I misquoted him if I were to state that in his " History 

 of our British Butterflies " he uses the name P. alexis, Scop., for the 

 insect generally known as P. agestis, and would he not insist that I 

 ought, before making such a statement, to have referred to his table 

 of corrigenda wherein he rejects that name in favour of P. medon ? 

 Mr. Dale then asks whether my statement that " Poda was the first 

 to describe the insect " which he called sinon is correct, and refers to 

 an earlier description by Ray. Ray, however, was anterior to 

 Linnaeus and the latter gives no description of podalirius till 1763 ; 

 his mere reference to Ray in " Syst. Nat. Ed. X. " cannot be held to 

 bring that work into adequate conformity with Rule 12 of the British 

 Association. 



Into the vexed question of the identity of hyale, L., I made no 

 attempt to enter fully ; to do so would require more space than the 

 Editor would probably care to devote to it. It is a problem difficult 

 of solution and one upon which my own mind is by no means made 

 up. Mr. Dale seemed to consider the Linnaean references sufficient 

 to settle it, and I pointed out some arguments on the other side which 

 must be taken into account. Mr. Dale still trusts in the Linnaean 

 references, and says he " cannot imagine Linnaeus to be such a bad 

 naturalist as to mistake figures of edusa for hyale." Let us see : Erebia 

 ligea is an insect with an easily recognisable facies ; for the benefit of 

 those who do not know it, it may be mentioned that its upper surface 



