EREMASCACEAE IMPERFECTAE 195 



new standard species whicli will conserve a name in one of its traditional uses and rename all 

 the species which do not conform to the tradition selected. By either alternative the outlook 

 is not bright for the medical man. To adopt the first would make a break with the past and 

 involve a renaming of many of the species, and discarding the majority as unidentifiable on 

 account of poor description. Unless this were formally legalized by an International Congress 

 of Botanists, there would always be trouble from the legalist, the historian, and the publicity 

 seeker by their puerile attempts to overturn existing nomenclature in favor of their own 

 interpretation of some older name. 



If the second alternative is adopted, it must also be secured through the action of an 

 International Congress of Botanists in which each faction would vote for the particular tradi- 

 tion in the application of a name to which they were accustomed, with the deciding vote held 

 by the systematists dealing with flowering plants who v.ould have no interest in, or knowledge 

 of, the matter, and would decide it on national lines. 



By either horn of the dilemma, action by an International Botanical Congress is neces- 

 sary and one is confronted by the practical problem as to which method to adopt, pending 

 action by such a congress, which is apt to postpone resolutions for a generation; e.g., the 

 action on bacterial nomenclature laid on the table at Brussels in 1910 for action at the next 

 congress has not been acted upon yet. In view of the action of the last congress at Cambridge, 

 England, in 19.30, in adopting the principle of the type species determination of the name, I 

 have attempted to apply this principle strictly, and if the type species belongs in another 

 genus with an older valid name, the genus name to which that type species belongs becomes a 

 synonym of the earlier name. Where no type species can be definitely decided upon, I have 

 adopted the view that it should be applied to the species which would produce the fewer new 

 combinations by such applications. 



MONILIA 



Monilia Gmelin, Sy.st. Nat. 2: 1487, 1791. 



Gmelin segregated as Monilia various species previously placed in Mucor and Aspergillihs, 

 iefining the genus as " Fila moniliformia in capitulum congregata." Most of the species 

 belong to the genera Aspergillus and PenicilUum, although it is almost impossible to identify 

 them with current species. Persoon took up the genus in Neues, Mag. Bot. 1: 121, 1794 

 (Dispositio 40, 1797) practically repeating Gmelin 's diagnosis but confining it to the erect 

 species. He recognized four species, M. aurea, M. rosea, M. glauca, and M. Candida, M. rosea 

 being described and figured by Batsch, the other three by Micheli. The latter belong in 

 Aspergillus, where Micheli originally placed them. M. rosea Batsch is probably Trichothecium 

 roseum. Consequently, we may eliminate these early uses of Monilia as having no nomencla- 

 torial value, unless preventing a later usage. Persoon, in his Syn. Meth. Fung., divides the 

 genus into three groups of which the first two refer to Aspergillus sp. with radiate heads 

 (with a slight admixture of other things) and those with columnar heads; while the third 

 refers to Torula which he had already defined earlier as a separate genus and which he 

 later regarded as separate. In his Myc. Eur. 1822, Persoon uses Monilia as a synonym of 

 Aspergillus. Link used Monilia in the sense of and instead of Torula. This, however, is 

 untenable, since by none of the rules can Monilia in its original usage include the dark-spored 

 species now referred to Torula and Dematium. 



Fries, in the Systema, uses Monilia as practically a straight synonym of PenicilUum. 



Bonorden (Eandbuch 1851) defines Monilia in practically the same terms previously used 

 to define Oidium, treating Monilia Candida from rotten wood as the type of the genus, and 

 describing M. cinerea from rotting cherries as new. Saccardo includes the type of Oidium 

 in his genus Monilia which includes both saprophytes and parasites of plants. Therefore none 

 of the usages of Monilia except that of Bonorden in the first century of its history is ac- 

 ceptable in the modern sense. 



