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THE ALUMNI JOURNAL, 



A. PH. A. 



The 44th annual meeting of the Amer- 

 ican Pharmaceutical Association was 

 held at Montreal, Canada, August 12th 

 to 19th. The attendance was compari- 

 tively small, about 200 signed the reg- 

 ister. 



The delegation from the College com- 

 prised A. H. Mason, Profs. Rusby, Cob- 

 lentz, Jelliflfe and Chas. Holzhauer. 

 Thos. F. Main represented the Alumni 

 Association; other members present were 

 W. O. Allison, W. C. Alpers, G. Grego- 

 rius, Prof. J. U. Lloyd, (Corresponding) 

 Caswell A. Mayo, John M. Peters and 

 George J. Seabury who was chairman of 

 the Commercial Section. 



Dr. Charles Rice, chairman of Com- 

 mittee for Revising U. S. Pharmacopoeia 

 was unable to be present. 



Prof. Sadtler was chairman of the 

 Scientific Section, and W. C. Alpers, sec- 

 retary. 



The report of the special ' ' Committee 

 on Research." presented by Prof. A. B. 

 Prescott was of great interest and the 

 work accomplished of the highest scien- 

 tific import. 



Among the papers read in this Section 



were "History and Names of Rhamnus 

 Purshia7ia" by J. U. Uoyd, and " Stro- 

 phanthus Seeds" by S- E. Jelliffe. 



The Section on Education and Eegis- 

 lation held two sessions. C. S. N. Hal- 

 berg, chairman. 



W. C. Alpers, M. D. was elected chair- 

 man, and Prof. Coblentz, secretary of the 

 Scientific Section. Prof. Coblentz was 

 also elected a member of the ' ' Re.search 

 Committee" for one year. 



Prof. Rusby was elected chairman of 

 the Committee on the Ebert Prize. 



It will be of interest to the Alumni to 

 know that W. A. Frost, Class of '77, 

 now of St. Paul, Minn., was elected 2d 

 Vice-President of the Association. Mr. 

 Frost is also president of the Minnesota 

 State Board of Pharmacy. 



Prof. J. E. Morrison, of Montreal, is 

 the new president of the Association. 



RESULTS OF FOLLOWING THE RULE OF 

 PRIORITY IN PLANT NAflES. 



By prok. h. h. rusby. 

 In an editorial in the Pharmaceutical 

 Journal (January iSth, page 52), entitled 

 "The 'Index Kewensis' and Botanical 

 Nomenclature," occurs the following 

 statement: "The decade 1885 to 1895 

 has been a very busy one, not only for 

 would-be reformers of botanical nomen- 

 clature, who have probably added some 

 fifty thousand names to the already ap- 

 palling synonomy of previously described 



plants," etc. 



Further on the critic admits the general 

 acceptance of the rules, but with the provision 

 that well-known and accepted names should 

 not be disturbed. It would appear, therefore, 

 that "fifty thousand" synonyms are regarded as 

 the difference between the results of the rigid 

 following approved of by the ' ' would-be re- 

 formers " and those of their limited acceptance 

 by the would-not-be reformers. It can hardly 

 be that so extreme a view can be entertained, 

 and we must read the above number as applying 

 to all the synonyms resulting from the most 

 rigid following of the rules of priority. 



Without desiring to continue an argument as 

 to the desirability or undesirability of rigidly 

 following the rule of priority, upon which sub- 

 ject it lias now virtually been agreed to disagree, 

 we feel ourselves called upon to take exception 

 to the evident bearing of the above remarks 

 upon the objects sought by the reformers of 

 botanical nomenclature and upon the results of 

 following their advice. It is worth while to re- 

 mark in passing that the limited acceptance of 

 these rules has been unwilling, and has been 

 stubbornly fought by the same representatives 

 who now oppose their full acceptance. If the 

 partial reform is now to be regarded as satisfac- 

 tory it certainly entitles those who have eflfected 

 it to respectful, if not grateful mention. It is 

 not true, as invariably stated by the disputants 

 upon the other side, that the object or result of 

 observing priority is to increase synonymy. 

 Upon the other hand, the first object in view by 

 most of those who advocate it, is to prevent such 

 increase, and it is safe to say that but for this 

 object the proposition would find but a small 

 following. Present synonymy is, as stated by 

 the above writer, "appalling," resulting in their 

 now being some 700,000 names for 200,000 

 plants, but it has nearly all resulted from a fail- 



