96 Rhodora [May 
3 
been “playing the game” of nomenclature so long that it has been 
impossible to reconvert the erring ones to sound doctrine (on this 
point at least) before the "game" became too much an object in 
itself to be renounced. Even at the risk of seeming to lay undue 
emphasis upon points which in a local flora are comparatively un- 
important, attention should be called to certain nomenclatorial 
practices which are either distinctly retrogressive or else totally at 
variance with the botanical traditions which should guide botanical 
authors. A distinctly retrogressive tendency is shown in the con- 
tinued use of “duplicate monomials"; the method of author citation 
is an instance of useless and uncalled for violation of botanical tradi- 
tion. Only one author (the one who first used the specific or “ sub- 
specific" adjective) is cited,— in parenthesis if the name has been 
modified by later authors, but otherwise not. One need not look 
beyond the pages of the New Jersey flora to see how this method lends 
itself to error, for in the cases of seventeen out of the sixty "sub- 
specific" names which Mr. Stone uses, he has misapplied the paren- 
theses. If zoologists commonly ascribe a quarter of the names they 
mention to authors who never published them, it is sincerely to be 
hoped that botanists will not follow zoological precedent. 
A practice which cannot be too strongly condemned is that of 
making new combinations without in any way indicating them as new. 
(See Bot. Gaz. xliv, p. 304, 1907.) This Mr. Stone appears to have 
done in eleven cases among the sixty "subspecific" names in his 
book. There are also new combinations among the specific names. 
For example, Panicum commonsianum addisonit “Nash,” Carex 
leptalea harperi “ Fernald,” Rubus villosus enslenii *'Tratt.," Euthamia 
graminifolia nuttallii (Greene), B|lephariglottis] canbyi “ Ames," and 
Gyrostachys beckii (Lindley) are all new combinations, but not 
indicated as such; those with the authority in quotation marks are 
moreover “falsely branded"; finally, all illustrate the abominable 
habit which zoologists have of decapitalizing personal names. 
Except for nomenclatorial innovations “The Plants of Southern 
New Jersey" is a remarkably pleasing work. It has numerous 
carefully executed illustrations,— line-drawings, photographs of 
paintings by H. E. Stone, and photographs from nature. Some of 
them, especially the photographs of grasses and sedges, it would be 
hard to excel. It is safe to predict that none of the local floras now 
current will be longer held in esteem by botanists generally than this 
one of Mr. Stone's. To special students of the coastal plain vegeta- 
tion it will of course be indispensable. Such a work reflects great 
credit not only upon its author but also upon the state which publishes 
it and upon those members of the Philadelphia Botanical Club whose 
enthusiastic cooperation made it possible.— H. H. BARTLETT, Bethesda, 
Maryland. 
Volume 14, no. 160, including pages 57 to 80, was issued 8 April, 1912. 
