U2 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



E. rosewn, Schreb., and certain Continental authors have 

 actually discarded the latter name in consequence ; besides 

 which, the confusion so long existing between E. tetragonum 

 (auct), E. obscurum, and E. Lamyi, renders the retention of 

 the old aggregate name wholly undesirable. 



3. E. rosmarinifolium was omitted in consequence of a 

 communication from the late Dr. Buchanan White, who con- 

 cluded that the alleged Glen Tilt station was erroneous. I 

 am not aware that it has become permanently established 

 anywhere in Britain. 



4. Mr. Druce states (p. 39) that " Villars wrote ' Epilobium 

 alsinifolium! ' Haussknecht gives references to Vill., " Prosp.," 

 45 (1779), and " Hist. Dauph.," iii. 51 I (1789). Mr. Britten, 

 of the British Museum, has kindly informed me that the 

 library there does not contain the first-named work, but that 

 the second reference reads thus : " Epilobium alsin^folium, 

 ' Prosp.,' 45." The monographer appears, therefore, to be 

 correct. 



What field botanists have most to complain about nowa- 

 days is the ceaseless and kaleidoscopic changing of names, 

 purely for the sake of change : a course of which Mr. Druce 

 is one of the most industrious exponents. We are continually 

 being called upon to abandon familiar titles, in accordance 

 with the law of priority ; and, in many cases, no sooner has 

 the latest fashion been painfully acquired than we are jauntily 

 told that the correction needs re-correction. Life is too short 

 for the continual repetition of such a process, and many of 

 us are heartily sick of it. If there is to be alteration, let it 

 be deliberate, authoritative, and final. The state of chaos 

 into which we are rapidly drifting threatens to make our 

 science a laughing-stock. Apparently, names were not made 

 for plants, but plants for names. I, for one, am sorry, seeing 

 to what a position we have been driven, that the suggestion 

 made (ten years ago) by one of our most accurate British 

 botanists, viz. that Nyman's " Conspectus " should be followed, 

 has been discarded. A fairly good standard is better than 

 (practically) no standard at all ; and that would, at least, 

 have kept us in touch with Continental practice. 



