163 
not attended to, it Las not been intentional on the part of the nominator, but has 
arisen from inability, or carelessness, or from a wish to adopt a similarity of ter¬ 
mination. Connected with this subject is the desirableness of a similarity of ter¬ 
mination* in tbe names of the species of a genus, agreeing also, if possible, with 
the termination of the generic name itself; hut I must decline giving my opinion 
whether this be feasible or not in all cases. As one great means towards effecting 
a classical uniformity of nomenclature, it appears to me desirable that generic 
names should be of Greek, and specific names of Latin, origin; this distinction 
has been already obscurely and insufficiently acted upon, as will appear by refer¬ 
ence to any general catalogue, but so inadequately and imperfectly as to form only 
exceptions to the rule. If the rule of grammatical propriety be not attended to in 
the first instance, any succeeding writer whose ear may be offended by the impro¬ 
per expression will feel called upon to alter the erroneous name ; and this, in very 
many cases, would cause so great an alteration in the form of the word as to add to 
the already too numerous list of synonyms. As an example, the first which occurs 
to me, and, therefore, by no means so strong a one as might be adduced, I will 
take the generic name of the common Brown Owl, Aluco auctorum . Now this 
word does not occur in the Latin language, but doubtless Alucus was intended, 
which may be found in all dictionaries (whether from the habits of the bird it has 
anything to do with “ lucus a non lucendo” is more than I can say) : of this I was 
not aware when I first published my Guide to an Arrangement of British Birds , 
but as soon as I discovered the error I corrected it in the Supplement, The 
English names of our birds remain last to be considered, but for tbe present I 
must leave the subject: when I resume it, I will give a synoptical table of British 
ornithology, formed according to the rules laid down above, as the basis of a second 
edition of the Guide , which I am now preparing. 
( To be continued). 
ON THE CHELIFER. 
It has been generally admitted that the Chelifer , a species of small articulated 
octopod animal, does not spin a filament like their congener, the Spider. Mr. 
Lucas has, however, established that the Ghelifers do possess the faculty of secret¬ 
ing a given number of threads, but to a smaller extent than those of the Spider, 
and under different circumstances of locality; which, doubtless, led to the errone¬ 
ous opinion hitherto entertained by Naturalists on this subject. 
* Above all things, there should be no difference of gender in the several species 
genus. 
y 2 
