CLXVI 
were overlooked by the majority of botanists, 
and others seem to have been purposely 
neglected; so that in many instances the cur- 
rent and commonly accepted names were of 
more recent publieation than those of other 
authors. As there appeared to be no way out 
of the practice of citing the author of a given 
combination of generic and specific names, it 
followed that the only fair procedure would 
be to adopt the name and give credit to the 
man who first published a change generally 
accepted; because the presumption was that 
it was always possible, and usually probable, 
that the later author was aware of the earlier 
publieation. If an author published later than 
another, his names must be relegated to the 
synonymy. This is all very well in theory, 
and is not so very difficult to put into prac- 
tice, so far as recent writers are concerned, 
once we have proved the identity of plants 
under different names; but when we come to 
the older writers, all sorts of doubts and 
ambiguities arise, and it seems much better 
to retain generic and specifie names that are 
as well established as a thing can be in the 
uncertainties of the relative rank of vegetable 
organisms. "The struggle of literary botanists 
to bring the law of priority into operation 
has, as will presently be shown, resulted in 
Suecessive changes in nomenclature, each one 
carrying his investigations a little further than 
his predecessors, and extending the backward 
limit of authority for the establishment of 
genera and species, until the whole thing has 
drifted into a lamentable and undignified race 
between persons who deal in dates, and are 
even prepared to make all sorts of evasions 
of ordinary rules in order to gratify their 
eraze for reviving old names. 
It is hardly necessary to say that these 
successive changes, apart from the great diver- 
gencies as to the limitations of genera and 
species, have a most deterrent effect on the 
progress of the study of systematie botany, 
and make it ridieulous in the eyes of persons 
who regard a name as merely a means to 
an end. 
In 1867 a Botanical Congress was held 
in Paris, to which botanists of all countries 
had been invited, and the most important sub- 
ject  diseussed "was botanical nomenclature. 
Mr. A. de Candolle had drawn up a most 
carefully considered code of rules to govern 
botanists in their writings; and this code was 
submitted to the assemblage of botanists, each 
rule being formulated and modified as the 
majority deemed wise. Finally, the whole 
was printed and ecireulated. The fundamental 
principle of these laws was priority of publi- 
cation with adequate descriptions, and untor- 
tunately it was made retrospective, without 
any sufficiently defined statute of limitations. 
For reasons of their own, the Kew botanists 
took no part in the proceedings of this Con- 
all the persons almost who know anything 
about the plant know it by the old name." 
This all seems very sad; but how does it 
differ from what .follows when some well. 
known plant is transferred by "the Kew bota- 
nists" to another genus, for botanieal reasons? 
To take an example, the plants known in 
gardens as Glovrinia are placed by Bentham 
and Hooker under Sínningia. Most of "the 
literature connected with the plants is under 
another name, allthe figures likewise, and all 
the persons almost wbo know anything about 
the plants know them by the old name." 
"The idea," therefore, to «continue quoting 
from Mr. Hemsley, *of giving a gardener a 
resuscitated generie  name"—for  Stuningia 
dates from. 1825—*' is too absurd,"— or if not, 
why not? 
Do *the Kew botanists" follow one system 
for ''the botanieal nomenelature current in 
gardens" (for which, according to Mr. Hems- 
ley, they are "almost exclusively responsible" !) 
and another for "the vast named ocollections 
at Kew" (the naming of which, by the way, 
in the living plants leaves something to be 
desired)? If so, how does this tend to con- 
venience? If not, why is it more inconvenient 
to change a name for literary than for scien- 
lifie reasons? 
Mr. Hemsley allows his feelings to run 
away with him when he says that *we are 
asked to sacrifice everything that belongs to 
the present for the sake of a 'principle that 
involves endless confusion." Every change 
causes some confusion; but the sooner it is 
made, the less will the confusion be. If Ben- 
tham and Hooker, for instance, had adopted 
the earlier name Trichosporum for Aeschyn- 
anthus, they would have been followed by 
Mr. C. B. Clarke, and at least half the species- 
would have at once received their proper 
namé: now, so soon as anyone chooses to re- 
name them, the names under which they are 
published must become synonyms. As to the 
causing of confusion,— of unnecessary con- 
fusion, moreover,—''the Kew botanists" can 
hardly plead exemption from that charge. 
Mr. Hemsley must surely have forgotten the 
wonderful Kew seed-list for 1885, a notice 
of which appeared in this Journal for June, 
1886: one would like to know what the 
gardeners and others "interested in vegetable 
produets" thought of *Delphinium Monsieur 
Viola Hort.," and the large number of similar 
names whieh the lise contained. 
Mr. Hemsley quotes with approval Mr. 
Bentham's dietum that it would be "mere 
pedantry, highly inconvenient to botanists, 
and So far detrimental to science, now to 
substitute Fibichia for Cynodon, or Sieglingia 
for T'riodia." Yet both of these are adopted 
in the las& two issues of the London Cata- 
logue, and Sieglingia appears in two local 
floras; and, as far às one ean judge, *nobody 
