INTRODUCTION 17 
1,223 genera and 155 families. Of these at least one family 
and 116 genera have no known representatives in the Archi- 
pelago; and about 1,948 species, or 44 per cent of the total, 
do not occur in the Philippines, or at least have not been dis- 
covered in the course of the extensive field operations that have 
been carried on since the year 1883. The net result of the 
publication of the Novissima Appendix has been the burdening 
of the Philippine botanical literature with the names of nearly 
2,000 species that do not occur in the Archipelago and which 
for the most part can never be placed in the synonymy of actual 
Philippine species, as descriptions are lacking, and no herbarium 
specimens representing them are extant. 
I quote here two passages from a previous consideration of 
this work which covers the other points at issue:*’ 
The most striking example of this phase of Philippine botany—that is, 
the accrediting to the Archipelago of species that do not extend to the 
Philippines—is that presented by the “Novissima Appendix” to the third 
edition of Blanco’s “Flora de Filipinas,” for which Fathers C. Fernandez- 
Villar and A. Naves are responsible. It we take into consideration the 
comparatively recent date at which this work was prepared (1877-83), it is 
difficult to explain the great mass of inaccurate data that was compiled by | 
these authors. The errors of Blanco, working between the years 1805 and 
1845, and of Llanos, working between the years 1850 and 1873, sink into 
insignificance when compared with those of the authors of the third edition 
of Blanco’s work. In spite of the more recent date at which Fernandez- 
Villar and Naves worked, their errors are caused primarily by the same 
circumstances that influenced the work of Blanco and of Llanos. These 
causes were essentially a lack of knowledge of the Indo-Malayan flora; a 
lack of knowledge of the Philippine flora as a whole, due to insufficient 
botanical exploration; a lack of botanical material, both Philippine and 
extra-Philippine; a lack of botanical literature; and an inadequate concep- 
tion of the principles of the geographic distribution of plants. Apparently 
neither author corresponded with European botanists, and they certainly 
sent no botanical material to Europe for identification or for comparison 
with types preserved in various public and private herbaria. 
In most cases an admitted species is followed by the indication that the 
authors had seen living specimens, usually with an indication of the island, 
province, and town in which the plant was alleged to have been seen, and 
frequently with the citation of native names. Some admissions are based 
on actual herbarium specimens from the collections of Vidal, but where 
these have been checked on Vidal’s specimens, the identifications are usually 
found to be wrong. It seems to be apparent that the authors in compiling 
the “Novissima Appendix” took the standard books that were available to 
them, various monographs, Miquel’s “Florae Indiae Batavae,” Hooker’s 
“Flora of British India,” so far as published, and credited to the Philip- 
” Merrill, E. D. Genera and apetien erronaeahy-sretites: No the Faitiy: 
pine Flora. Philip. Journ. Sci. 10 E (38) Bot. 171-194. 
1518622 
