ENTOMOLOGIST AND BOTANIST. 
171 
SCIENTIFIC LANGUAGE. 
BY W. Y. ANDREWS, NEW YORK. 
Ordinarily, if we seek to convey information 
>n any important subject, we make our language 
is plain and clear as our ability permits us. In 
creating of scientific subjects some authors seem to 
reverse this common-sense rule, and to conceive 
hat the harder and more unusual the words are 
n which they clothe their ideas, the more fitting 
md appropriate they are for the purpose of in¬ 
fraction. This, at all events, is the most 
heritable construction we can put upon their 
:onduct, for surely it is not the avowed object 
>f the instructor to puzzle and bewilder his 
>upils. These remarks, although applicable to 
he language of scientific treatises in general, 
,re especially so to those written on the “Natural 
Sciences,” and particularly to those on Botany 
,nd Entomology. With the former I do not 
)ro»pose to deal at present. 
Dr. Knaggs tells us that “ pursuit of truth , 
oith a love of nature , and a laudable desire to 
nvestigate the histories of the wonderf ul organ- 
sms which God has , in his wisdom , created ,” 
ire among the motives that induce men to be¬ 
come entomologists. Such being the case, it 
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because it is evident that the assertion that it is 
necessary to use terms derived from the “ learned 
languages” in teaching a science which is some¬ 
times studied by persons not acquainted with 
the English language, will not bear a moment’s 
investigation. 
In a work devoted to entomology I find the 
following sentence: “Head and thorax, above, 
obscure brown mixed with ashen scales. Abdo¬ 
men, obscure testaceous-cinereous .’’ By reference 
to a Latin dictionary we find that “testaceous” ' 
may mean “brick-colored,” and “cinereous” 
“ashen-grey.” So “ obscure testaceous-cinereous ” 
means a color which is an u obscure brick-colored 
ashen-grey ;” and anybody who is sufficiently 
versed in the English language to understand 
the phrase, “ Head and thorax obscure-brown,” 
would probably understand “ obscure brick- 
colored ashen-grey ” just as readily as he would 
comprehend “ obscure testaceous-cinereous ,” the 
probability being that he would understand 
neither. The newspapers have been laughing 
at some contemporary for describing an oyster 
as a “ marine acephalous mollusc of the lamelli- 
branchiate order of the genus ostrea;” but is 
there anything in this more absurd than is to be 
found in many a te xt book o il e ntorn qToa-y ? 
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