. The Canadian field-naturalist. 1996 Cranmer-Byng: A Life with Birds 117. Field camp, Eastend, Saskatchewan, 1921. P. A. Tavemer, Alan Sampson, and H. M. Laing. (Reproduced cour- tesy of the Canadian Museum of Nature, number 53435.) expressed it, "... too many are guided by preconcep- tions, and refuse to look facts in the face".^^ Tavemer was too frank to pretend to notice a nuance of colour when he was sure that he could not. In his continuing disagreement with Brooks over when to create a subspecies and when not Taverner some- times wrote that he could not see the colour differ-
. The Canadian field-naturalist. 1996 Cranmer-Byng: A Life with Birds 117. Field camp, Eastend, Saskatchewan, 1921. P. A. Tavemer, Alan Sampson, and H. M. Laing. (Reproduced cour- tesy of the Canadian Museum of Nature, number 53435.) expressed it, "... too many are guided by preconcep- tions, and refuse to look facts in the face".^^ Tavemer was too frank to pretend to notice a nuance of colour when he was sure that he could not. In his continuing disagreement with Brooks over when to create a subspecies and when not Taverner some- times wrote that he could not see the colour differ- ences that Brooks declared existed. This exasperated Brooks so much that on one occasion he wrote blunt- ly, "No good talking to you of color distinctions. I really believe you are slightly color blind".^^ Tavemer argued that he was not, and wrote, "I do not think I am color blind. Nobody ever admitted such a thing of course, but I have tested myself against others and cannot find any evidence of ; In the same letter he complained that they may have misunderstood each other. "I may not always write perfectly clearly but I do not think you read any too carefully. At least you misunderstand a number of things I have ;^" Early in 1922 Taverner wrote a letter to the lead- ing systematics research workers of the AOU enclos- ing a statement protesting against what he consid- ered was the debasing of the concept of genus in ornithology by the proliferation of subgenera. He claimed that the tendency towards the finer division of the genus threatened to complicate nomenclature and taxonomy until each group in a genus became the private preserve of specialists in that group. He asked recipients of the statement to read it carefully, and return it with their opinion.^' Taverner must have known that he was "sticking his neck out" reck- lessly. He might as well have saved himself the trou- ble, but that was not his nature. By the end of t
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