specific names; 381 



Lathrcea Phelypcea, and Bartsia Gymnandra; 

 which may also be practised when a plant has 

 been celebrated, either in botanical, medical, 

 or any other history, by a particular name, 

 as Origanum Dictamnus, Artemisia Dra- 

 cunculus, Lauras Cinnamomum, Selinwn 

 Carvifolia, Carica Papaya. In either case 

 the specific name stands as a substantive, re- 

 taining its own gender and termination, and 

 must begin with a capital letter; which last 

 circumstance should be observed if a species 

 be called after any botanist that has more 

 particularly illustrated it, as Cortusa Mat- 

 thioli and C. Gmelini, Duranta Plumierii, 

 and Mutisii. The latter genus suggests an 

 improvement in such kind of names. The 

 genitive case is rightly used for the person 

 who founded the genus, IX Plumierii; IX 

 Mutisiana might serve to commemorate the 

 finder of a species, while D. Ellisia implies 

 the plant which bears it to have been once 

 called Ellisia. 



There is another sort of specific names in 

 the genitive case, which are to me absolutely 

 intolerable, though contrived by Linnaeus in 

 his latter days. These are of a comparative 



