SECRETARY'S PORTFOLIO. 545 



NOMENCLATURE. 



Multiplicity of Names. — Mr. A. S. Fuller, in discussing the difficulties 

 which beset the buyer of seeds, plants and trees, owing to the many names 

 given by different dealers, says: It is proper that every plant should have a 

 name by which it may be known to the entire civilized world. But when people 

 begin to multiply names until each variety of fruit, flower or vegetable has so 

 many that the dishonest dealer can take advantage of the circumstance to 

 swindle his customers, it is time to order a halt and request all honest men to 

 aid in suppressing the false, and endeavor to establish the true and original 

 name, if known. * * * No sooner does one seedsman 



offer a new variety of vegetable than every other dealer in the country will 

 have one with a similar name but a great deal better, and perhaps the seed was 

 raised by one man and from the same original stock. This practice has con- 

 tinued until every seedsman has his name attached to the very earliest and best 

 varieties of peas, cabbages, turnips, and similar garden vegetables. If seventy- 

 five per cent of all the names of garden vegetables and fruits in nurserymen's 

 catalogues were stricken out and the varieties to which they belong annihilated, 

 it would be no great loss, and might prove a great benefit. 



Professor Pope of the Maine Pomological Society is reported as expressing 

 the opinion that thousands of dollars are annually wasted from ignorance of 

 fruit nomenclature, whereby worthless varieties are distributed through 

 misrepresentations of agents, mistakes of nurserymen, and the stupidity of 

 farmers themselves. This is no doubt true, but it would be very difficult 

 for the average farmer to keep himself thoroughly informed in regard fo the 

 names and characteristics of all the new varieties of fruits and vegetables 

 annually produced in different parts of the world, and also to ascertain how 

 many old ones are renamed and brought out as new and desirable. The 

 fact is, there is altogether too much freedom in this industry, and men go on 

 from year to year giving new names to old plants without the least regard to 

 the names by which they are generally known. 



If our readers would avoid being swindled they should deal only with men 

 who have a reputation worth sustaining, which is more than can be said of 

 the large majority of the tree and seed peddlers who go about the country 

 soliciting orders, and at the same time pretending to supply better articles 

 than can be had at the local seed stores and nurseries. Furthermore, as a 

 general rule, there are far greater risks to be run in buying new varieties of 

 fruits, garden and farm seeds than in purchasing the old and well tested. 



Nomenclature of Garden Plants. — Prof. L. H. Bailey, in a lengthy 

 article discussing this subject, speaks as follows of the confusion existing: 

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