218 
Letters, Extracts, and Notes. 
familiar and an unfamiliar bird cannot be defined, and what 
is coirect in one case must be right in the other. 
However, about the necessity of correcting erroneous 
names commonly used for birds one might differ, and, 
knowing the views of the reviewer in ‘The Ibis/ I should 
not have taken the pains to write this letter. But the reviewer 
makes erroneous statements and is therefore apt to mislead 
those readers who are not in a position to investigate such 
nomenclatorial questions themselves. The reviewer says 
that the identification of Boddaert’s Motacilla borin is un¬ 
certain, and that the Motacilla hortensis of Gmelin “has 
been generally supposed to be the Garden-'Warbler.” These 
statements are wrong. The case is as follows :— 
Motacilla hortensis Gmelin, Syst. Nat. i. 1, p. 955 (1789), 
is taken from Brisson’s and Button’s description and 
Daubenton’s plate. The description of these authors and 
the plate of Daubenton shew unmistakably the Orphean 
Warbler; even Gmelin’s abridged diagnosis leaves no doubt 
about this, especially his description of the tail with the 
outer webs of the lateral rectrices white, a character peculiar 
to the Orphean Warbler but not found in the Garden- 
Warbler. The habitat given by Gmelin is France and 
Italy! Latham and other ornithologists understood this 
very well, and Latham therefore called the English variety 
of the bird described by Buffon and Brisson (i. e. the Garden- 
Warbler) Sylvia simplex. Unfortunately, however, there is 
an older name for the Garden-Warbler, namely Motacilla 
borin of Boddaert. This name was given to the “ Petite 
Fauvette” of Buffon and Brisson figured on the plate of 
Daubenton (PI. Enl. 579), and referring undoubtedly to the 
“ Garden-Warbler” as distinguished from the “ Fauvette,” 
i. e. the Orphean Warbler. Moreover, it has not generally 
been supposed that Gmelin’s Motacilla hortensis is the 
Garden-Warbler. Seebohm [cf. Cat. B. Brit. Mus. v. pp. 11 
and xiii) was very well aware of the facts, but he and 
other ornithologists took quite a singular and high-handed 
action in calling the Garden-Warbler “ Sylvia hortensis 
Bechstein ” instead of iC Sylvia hortensis Gmelin,” thus 
