7 
Among the most important efforts in this line, mention may be 
made of the following: 
Rudolphi (1801) proposed a set of rules to govern the names of 
parasites, but he failed to carry out consistently at least one of his 
most important paragraphs, and much as we owe to Rudolphi for his 
work in helminthology, work which we all freely admit to be brilliant 
when judged from the standards of his time, it must be admitted that 
he has made the nomenclature of parasites rather more involved than 
would be the case had he been consistent. 
One of the most important nomenclatural movements which has 
ever taken place, and one to which science owes much, was the pre- 
paration of the so-called “ Stricklandian Code, 7 ' also known as the 
“ British Association Code 11 or the “ B. A. Code.' 7 prepared in 1842-1:3 
by a committee of the British Association for the Advancement of 
Science. Strange to relate, the American Societ} T of Geologists and 
Naturalists adopted (1815) this code before it was adopted (1816) by 
the British Association. For some years American and English zoolo- 
gists followed this excellent code, which, together with the Linnsean 
Code (1751) forms the basis of all subsequent study of the subject. 
It will be noticed that the Linnsean and Rudolphi codes were pro- 
posed by individuals, the former applying to both botany and zoology, 
the latter only to a restricted group in zoology, while the B. A. Code 
emanated from a national society of English-speaking scientists. The 
tirst movement of an international nature seems to be due to the 
International Congress of Geology, which in 1881 adopted a code pre- 
pared by Douville to govern the names of the fossils. 
Prior to the Douville (1881) code, Dali (1877) prepared a very excel- 
lent code at the instance of the American Association for the Advance- 
ment of Science, and this set of rules, although never formally adopted 
by the association, is one of the best essa} T s on the subject that has 
ever been issued. 
The American Ornithologists 7 Union in 1885 adopted an excellent 
set of rules, which, known as the “A. O. U. Code, 7 ' has been followed 
by many American and foreign zoologists. Excellent as this set of 
rules is, it rests upon a fundamental theoretical error, so far as gen- 
eral zoological legislation is concerned, namety: This societ}^ is a lim- 
ited society, confined to specialists in a single group, hence zoologists 
at large had no opportunity to bring forward the difficulties and prob- 
lems of other groups, and they had no determining vote on the rules 
in question; under such circumstances, it could hardly be expected 
that the “A. O. U. Code 71 should be more than the union claimed for it, 
namely, a code to govern the scientific names of American birds. 
The influence of this code in this country, even in groups other than 
birds, has been very extensive and very excellent. 
To the farseeing judgment of Raphael Blanchard is due the concep- 
