810 Letters, Extracts from Correspondence, Notices, tyc. 
Mr. Wallace's letters from Ternate (of December 10th, 1860), 
enclosing the valuable paper already given ( anted,, p. 283), con¬ 
tain several passages which may interest our readers:— 
“ I do not like the figure of Semioptera wallacii : the shoulder- 
plumes are not sufficiently erected; neither is the contrast of 
colour between the pure whiteness and the dark silky ash of the 
back sufficiently marked.” 
“ The Dutch have just sent out a collector for the Leyden 
Museum to the Moluccas. He is now at Ternate, and goes to 
spend two years in Gilolo and Eatchian, and then to N. Guinea. 
He will, of course (having four hunters constantly employed, 
and not being obliged to make his collecting pay expenses), do 
much more than I have been able to do; but I think I have got 
the cream of it all. His name is Bernstein; he has resided long 
in Java, as doctor at a Sanatorium, and tells me he has already 
sent large collections to Leyden, including the nests and eggs 
of more than a hundred species of birds ! Are these yet arranged 
and exhibited ? They must form a most interesting collection *. 
“ Many thanks for your list of Parrots f. My collections 
already furnish many corrections of the localities. Allow me 
here to make a'remark on the constant changes of specific 
names by yourself and Mr. Gray. It strikes me that, by forcing 
the law of priority to its extreme limits, you create a complicated 
synonymy, instead of settling it. Was not that law made to 
decide among several names already in use—not to introduce 
diversity where uniformity of nomenclature has hitherto existed ? 
What is gained by changing Eclectus tinned into E. cardinalis, 
and Paradisea superba into P. atra, when it is almost certain 
that such changes will not be generally adopted ? I believe the 
synonymy of Natural History will never be settled till a tribunal 
shall be appointed by general assent, from whose decrees there 
shall be no appeal. It matters absolutely nothing whether a 
bird has one name or another; but it is of the utmost importance 
that it should not have two or three at once. A synonymical 
catalogue, which should be authoritative and final by the general 
* These have been described at length in two articles in Cabanis’ 
f Journal fur Ornithologie/ which we have already noticed ( e Ibis/ 1860, 
pp. 94 & 299). f See P. Z. S. 1860, p. 223. 
