Letters, Announcements, S^^c. 
381 
vides that where the description of a genus or species is not 
sufficient for its identification^ the name of such genus or 
species should be ignored in favour of the earliest name which 
is accompanied by a sufficient description. The practice of 
ornithologists has, however, established a rider to this statute, 
which we may call ornithological law. According to 
this uncodified law a name may stand upon the type specimen, 
if such exists; and the type specimen is allowed to eke out any 
deficiency, and to correct any slight error in the description, 
and even, in certain very exceptional cases, to condone its 
absence. 
I find that Swainson^s bird has too long a hill for Celtics 
Warbler. The culmen measures *6, whereas the culmen of 
Cetti^s Warbler varies from *45 to *55. It is also much more 
huffy or more rufous on the flanks and under tail-coverts 
than is usual in the European bird. The under tail-coverts are 
of a uniform cofiPee-brown, whereas those of Cetti^s Warbler 
are tipped with white. Finally, there cannot be a shadow 
of doubt that the specimen in question is not Cetti^s 
Warbler, because it has unmistakably twelve tail-feathers, 
the European bird possessing only ten. 
After “critically examining and comparing Swainson^s 
type of Bradypterus platyurus^^ with Levaillant^s plate of 
“Le Pavaneur in his Hist. Nat. des Ois. d^Afr. hi. p. 94, 
plate 122,1 see no reason why Swainson’s identification should 
not be correct. I have skins in my collection from the 
Transvaal almost exact duplicates of Swainson^s type. The 
genus Bradypterus, as applied to Cetti^s Warbler, therefore 
falls to the ground, and must be retained for the African bird. 
We cannot, however, retain Swainson’s speeific name, which 
dates from 1837 (Swains. Class, of Birds, ii. p. 241), inasmuch 
as Vieillot in 1817 (Nouv. Diet. d’Hist. Nat. xi. p. 206) had 
already founded his Sylvia brachyptera upon “ Le Pavaneur ” 
of Levaillant. The African bird, therefore (which is, by the 
way, better known to ornithologists by a name of still more 
recent date, Bradypterus sylvaticus, Sund.), must rejoice in the 
uneuphonious title Bradypterus brachypterus (Vieill.). 
Cetti’s Warbler was first figured in the Planches Enlumi- 
