An observation on Japanese Aconitum. 



By 

 T. Nakai. 



When a genus comprises very many species, the general 

 inclination of the botanists is to out-do nature herself, treating 

 a variety as a species, and a form as a variety. This method 

 sometimes enables one to shift himself out of perplexity ; but if 

 one step be taken in the wrong way, many species will be 

 confounded, and the botanist would be at a loss how to classify 

 a specimen which he has got ; in other words, he would not 

 know to which species the specimen in question should belong. 

 Such will be the case with Aconitum. In this respect, the vene- 

 rable J. D. Hooker already hinted cleverly, when he described 

 ' Aconitum Fischeri Re;ichb.' in Botanical Magazine. He says 

 " The reduction of the species and varieties of Aconitum is a 

 task awaiting the labour, and it will be no slight one, of a 

 very judicious botanist. Upward of 300 specific names have 

 been advanced for probably not more than 30 species " etc. 

 In fact, to find the true species and reject false ones is no easy 

 task, and if the gradual transition of nature can combine 

 different species into one and form but a single species out of 

 xrxsiny, a great number of them w^ill be reduced into one, because 

 their variable nature and hybrid-forms are found everywhere. 



In our Institute, many Japanese specimens are preserved 

 under the nime of * Aconitum Fischeri.^ There is no species, as 

 Hooker says, w^hich occupies a wider geographical area than 

 Aconitum Fischeri and therefore it has so many forms that it 

 can not be easily described. One may imagine at a glance 

 that all our specimens may be reduced into Aconitum Fischeri ; 

 but the fact is not so. 



The fault is perhaps due to the indefinite descriptions of it 

 by different authors. If the very first author whom you meet 



