170 
Recent Literature. 
this country, or to appreciate the thoroughly substantial character of 
the evidence on which it is based.” * Mr. Ridgway, in fact, had the 
preceding year (1875) f adopted a purely trinomial system for the desig- 
nation of local or intergrading forms, superseding it, however, and as we 
believe unwisely, two years later, by interposing Greek letters between 
specific and varietal names, the reason for which he appears to have now 
for the first time made public. 
The necessity of trinomials being granted, there still seems to us no 
reason why the triple name should be rendered ne-edlessly cumbersome 
by the virtual interposition of a fourth term, as “ var.,” “ subsp.,” a Greek 
letter, or other arbitrary sign, between the specific and varietal names. 
If anything is to be thus interposed, the designation “ var.” seems to be 
the least objectionable, being shorter than “ subsp.” and less open to com- 
plication than any system of arbitrary signs, “ var.” being of course thus 
used in a purely technical, and not in the usual “ dictionary ” sense of the 
word “variety,” just as “family,” in its technical use in zoology, has come 
to have special significance. As Mr. Ridgway observes, the sooner an 
agreement is reached respecting the method of writing trinomials, the 
better, and why has not simplicity here great merit ? There must, in the 
nature of the case, always he diversity of opinion as to how slight a varia- 
tion should be entitled to nominal recognition ; in a polymorphic species, 
for example, like Melospiza fasciata, the number of namable geographical 
races may vary, let us say, from three to half a dozen, in accordance with 
the views or predilections of different writers, or of the same writer at differ- 
ent times, in which case is it probable that the y or 8 of A will be the y 
or 8 of B or C ? To cite a case already in hand, Melospiza fasciata , y of 
Ridgway, 1877, is fallax, while Melospiza fasciata , y of Ridgway, 1879, is 
guttata, and fallax is now “ 8 fallax .” The use of the Greek characters 
by the early systematists, as Linne, Erxleben, Gmelin, etc , being simply 
a system of numeration, and relating, in nearly nine cases out of ten, to 
' forms of an albinistic or melanistic character, or resulting from domesti- 
cation or hybridization, seems to have little force as a precedent bearing 
upon the matter of trinomials as a designation for geographical races or 
incipient species. 
As already stated, Mr. Ridgway was the first to adopt the system of 
pure trinomials, and we regret to note his divergence therefrom, — espe- 
cially since they have been since systematically used by Coues in his 
“Birds of the Colorado Valley,” as well as in some of his earlier and con- 
temporaneous papers on birds and mammals, and also by Brewster and 
other writers, in this Bulletin and elsewhere, and since, furthermore, each 
month shows a growing tendency to its uniform adoption by American 
* Progress of Orn. in the United States, etc., Am. Nat., Vol. X, p. 550, 
September, 1876. 
t Proc. Essex Institute, Vols. VI and VIII (separates dated March, 1875). 
