LANDMARKS OF BOTANICAL HISTORY GREENE 255 



and posture of steins, and more upon characteristics of flowers and 

 fruits. And his small group of the Lappae 1 was equally futile; 

 for while this series might at first view seem to be connected upon 

 a thread of fruit characters, a more attentive inspection brings 

 it out that nothing more significant than the hooked character of 

 the prickles investing the fruits holds the genera together ; for they 

 are Lappa, Xanthium, Trapa, Caucalis, and Agrimonia. Thus 

 Tragus' two new family names, Serpentarias and Lappce, were both 

 destined to suppression, because the grouping in either case was 

 little better than fanciful; being based on agreement as to certain 

 peculiarities that are of no general taxonomic value. 



Upon the then settled principles of generic nomenclature 

 principles approved by all antiquity Tragus attempts no inroads. 

 It does not enter his thought to question the perfection of the 

 established methods in naming things. A generic name of two 

 words, noun and adjective, suits him as well as one of a sing'e term 

 and that substantive ; perhaps even better, as signifying somewhat 

 more; for there is more of meaning conveyed by a noun qualified 

 by an adjective than there is in a noun standing alone ; and the time 

 is yet distant when meaningless and cabalistic names will be toler- 

 ated. So when he becomes the discoverer of a new and nameless 

 generic type that is an ally of Cyanus, the common cornflower, or 

 bluebottle, though not of its genus exactly, he assigns the new 

 genus the compound name Cyanus silvestris 2 ; and we, well aware 

 that half the generic names in sixteenth-century botany are thus 

 made, must read his whole account of the plant in order to assure 

 ourselves that he does not, after all, mean simply a new species 

 of the genus Cyanus. 



Fuchsius, convinced that the genus Plantago aquatica is identifi- 

 able as the Alisma of the Greeks, had taken up the latter name 3 ; 

 but Tragus shows a preference for the two-worded appellation 

 and restores it; taking pains also to inform the untaught that, 

 although the plant's name is Plantago aquatica, it does not belong 

 to the genus Plantago.* 



Even for Fuchsius' new genus aptly named Digitalis 5 Tragus 

 thinks that such a two-worded name as Campanula silvestris would 

 be better; and he formally proposes this as a substitute, writing 



' Stir p. Comm., pp. 836844. 



3 Ibid., pp. 218, 219. 



Fuchs, Hist. Stirp., p. 43. 



4 Stirp. Comm., p. 227. 



* Fuchs, Hist. Stirp., p. 892. 



