Mar., 1919 MILITARY SERVICE RECORD 91 flee of the American Representative, Franco-American War Affairs Commis- sion, Elys6e Palace, Paris, France. (Dec., 1918.) SHELTON, Alfred C., Second Lieutenant, San- itary Corps, Camp Crane, Pa. (Jan., 1919.) Discharged. SILLI3{AN, Edmund, Naval Reserve. (Feb., 1919.) Sa?ITH, Allyn G., Second Lieutenant, Air Ser- vice, Instructor, Radio Officers' Training School, Columbia 'University, New York City. (Dec., 1918.) STIVERS, Dr. C. G., Captain, Medical Corps, Air Service, San Francisco. (Dec., 1918.) STODDARD, H. L., Sergeant, Co. B, 311th Am- munition Train, A. E. F., France. (Dec., 1918.) STORER, Tracy I., First Lieutenant, Sanitary Corps, Laboratory Car 'Metchnikoff,' Ft. Sam Houston, Texas. (Jan., 1919.) Dis- charged. SWEENEY, J. A., Private, Co. E, 2d Battalion, 20,th Engineers (Forest), A. E. F., France. (Auk, Jan., 1919.) TrLER, Dr. Winsor M., Captain, Medical Corps, Ft. Adams, R.I. (Auk, Jan., 1919.) UFFORD, Elmer D., A. E.F. (Feb., 1919.') V.?n ROSSE?r, Adrlaan, First Lieutenant, Ma- chine Gun School, Camp Hancock, Ga. (Dec., 1918.) WALKER, Alex., Battery A., 45th Regiment, Coast Artillery Corps, A. E. F., France. Dec., 1918.) WOOD, Casey A., Lieutenant Colonel, Medical Corps, Staff of Surgeon General, Wash- ington, D.C. (Dec., 1918.) Entered service, June, 1917. Earlier, in charge of Examining Unit, Chicago, Ill., and then Chief of Head Survey, Camp Sherman, Ohio. Recently, Acting-Director of Board on Medical and Surgical History of the War. (Dec., 1918.) WRIGHT, Howard, Navy. YounG, John P., Major, Camp Dix, N.J. COMMUNICATION TRINOl?IIALS AND CURRENT PRACTICE Editor TttE CONDOR: It seems to me that various points brought up by .Swarth in his review (CONDOR, XX, 1918, pp. 141-142) of Taverner's papers in the "Summary Report of the Geological Survey, Department of Mines, for the Calendar Year 1916" (Ottawa, Canada), and Mr. Taver- ner's reply to the same (ibid., pp. 213-216), are worthy of further discussion. There have been several innovations in ornitholog- ical practice during the past year, and at least the main points of these merit careful consideration by American ornithologists. For bird papers of a strictly "popular" style, the method of procedure adopted by Mr. Taverner in his articles could be used with gratifying results. This class of liter- ature is increasing in quantity and popular- ity, and-for such, the purely trinomial no- menclature is admittedly cumbersome and confusing to many readers. How much bet- ter would it be for authors uniformly to use the binomial for the Latin, and the specific
name for its English equivalent, instead of
the name of the eastern race as is common- ly employed in such case. For entirely sci- entific, and what I may term popular-scien- tific work, however, the old system seems better, although it is far from ideal. 'Mr. Taverner says that the plan which he has followed "discourages the unconsidered copying of names and encourages original research". In future years, however, when gathering published information for a re- port on some general region, another author cannot personally verify all binomial rec- ords and identify all the specimens referred to. In fact, if this binomial system were in general ase, it would be almost impossible for anyone to prepare an authoritative re- port on a region, because of this difficulty of using previously published information. Even though Mr. Taverner does make trl- nomial notations at other points in his pa- pers, that does not alter the general com- plexion of the matter, for an article which is . both binomial and trinomial in nomencla- ture has the faults of both systems and the advantages of neither. I think that the majority will agree with Swarth that' "the value of such a llst lies largely in the exact subspeclflc determina- tion of the various forms at the points at which the specimens are taken"--all of the forms, and not just those which the author deems worthy of special notation. Unl.ess some contributions to the habits and life histories of birds are given also, that is its only value, as I see it. Although in the vast majority of lists, specimens of all subspecies mentioned have not been secured, one who is familiar with his locality can be reason- ably certain of identities, usually, and if he Is not, he should, and often does, indicate his uncertainty. To an expert in geograph- ical distribution, the binomial name possibly conveys all that is necessary, but the aver- age reader and bird student wants to know the probable form encountered, and will almost never bother to search out its logi- cal identity. I heartily agree that too many articles are "thrown together" without the proper
