BOTANICAL ADDRESS TO THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 7 



the specific portion of the original name, if possible. If it is, 

 however, already preoccupied in the genus to which the 

 transference is made, a new one must be devised. Many 

 modern systematists have, however, set up the doctrine that 

 a specific epithet once given is indelible, and whatever the 

 taxonomic wanderings of the organism to which it was once 

 assigned, it must always accompany it. This, however, 

 would not have met with much sympathy from Linngeus, who 

 attached no importance to the specific epithet at all: 'Noinen 

 specificura sine generico est quasi pistillum sine campana.'^^ 

 Linnasus always had a solid reason for everything he did or 

 said, and it is worth while considering in this case what 

 it was. 



Before his time the practice of associating plants in genera 

 had made some progress in the hands of Touruefort and 

 others, but specific names were still cumbrous and practically 

 unusable. Genera were often distinguished by a single 

 word; and it was the great reform accomplished by Linnseus 

 to adopt the binominal principle for species. But there is 

 tliis difference. Generic names are unique, and must not be 

 applied to more than one distinct group. Specific names 

 might have been constituted on the same basis; the specific 

 name in that case would then have never been used to desig- 

 nate more than one plant, and would have been sufficient to 

 indicate it. We should have lost, it is true, the useful infor- 

 mation which we get from our present practice in learning 

 the genus to which the species belongs; but theoretically a 

 nomenclature could have been established on the one-name 

 principle. Tlie thing, however, is impossible now, even if it 

 were desirable. A specific epithet like vulyaris may belong 

 to hundreds of different species belonging to as many 

 different genera, and taken alone is meaningless. A Linnean 

 name, then, though it consists of two parts, must be treated 

 as a whole. ' Nomen omne plantarum constabit nomine 

 generico et specifico.'^^ A fragment can have no vitality of 



28P7it7. 219. 29p/iJL, 212. 



