REVUE BRYOLOGIQUE 77 



should preserve names whose original definitions need to 

 be supplemented or corrected by reference to the original 

 specimens is a question concerning which botanists will 

 probably always difTer. 



In connection with this Porclla vs. Madotheca matter^ 

 it is of interest to quote recent words of the eminent he- 

 paticologist, Hcrr Franz Stephani, in the introduction to 

 his Species Ilepaticarum. Herr Stephani says (1) : Hin- 

 sichtlich der Prioritat der Gattungsnamen bin ich der 

 Ansicht gefolgt ; dass eine Diagnose, welclte die Pflanze 

 erkennen Idsst, sweifellos gefordert werden muss, ist die 

 alteste Diagno^se schlechl oder ist die Gattung eine zusam- 

 mengesctzte^ so muss diejenige jiingere Diagnose, welche 

 zuerst die Gattung geniigend und rein dargestellt hat, 

 benutzt und deren Name gewahlt werden. « It is impor- 

 tant to call attention to the fact that the carrying out of 

 the principle here enunciated by Herr Stephani is absolu- 

 tely destructive to the continued use of Madotheca as a 

 generic name. For, whatever differences of opinion there 

 maybe as to the sufficiency of theDillenian description 

 and figures of Porclla and of the Linnean citation of 

 these, it surpasses belief that Herr Stephani will contend 

 that S. F. Gray's diagnosis of Cavoidishia—a previous 

 equivalent of Madotheca — does not permit the plants to 

 be recognized, Dumortier's indictment that (c Kantius est 

 nomen hominis, non plantae " cannot be brought against 

 Cavendishia for Gray here departed from his usual custom 

 as regards hepatic genera and wrote the name in the 

 feminine. About the only thing S, F. Gray's description of 

 Cavendishia that can be considered positively wrong, as 

 I have already pointed out (2), is the attributing of a 

 monoicous character to the genus, while the species on 

 which it was based are uniformlv described by other sys- 

 tematists as dioicous. But if this is sufficient to justify the 

 condemning of the diagnosis as « schlecht », there are 

 many commonly recognized hepatic genera whose ori- 

 ginal foundations can be found to be faulty. The fact that 

 Lindley in 1 836 , — fifteen years later — applied the same 

 name to a genus of Yacciniaceae does not in the least affect 

 the ease with which Gray's diagnosis of the original La- 

 vendishia « die Pflanze erkennen Idsst. » And the dia- 

 gnoses of ^^//mrmm and ^y?/^/Waof Raddi— both prior 

 to Cavendishia and Madotheca — with the accompa- 

 nying ngures surelv permit the plants to be recognized 

 and neither is especialy false and neither is « erne siisam 



(1) Bull. nerb. Boissier, VI, p. 309, 1898. 



(2) Bull. Torr. Bot. Club, XXV, p. 99, 1898 



