The Chelsea Physic Garden, according to Dandy 
(1958), “‘was conveyed in 1722 to the Society of A pothe- 
‘aries by Sloane (who had purchased the manor of Chel- 
sea in 1712) on certain conditions, one of which was the 
‘rendering yearly to the President, Council and Fellows 
of the Royal Society of London, fifty specimens of dis- 
tinct plants, well dried and preserved, which grew in 
their garden the same year, with their names or reputed 
names; and those presented in each year to be specifi- 
‘ally different from every former year until the number 
of two thousand shall have been delivered’.”” This stip- 
ulation resulted in the accumulation of an herbarium of 
over 3000 specimens taken from the Sloane estate. The 
lists of plants so prepared were printed annually in the 
Philosophical Transactions (of the Royal Society) from 
1723 to 1774. In 1781, the specimens were transferred 
to the British Museum and are now incorporated in the 
general herbarium. 
Miller described the Chelsea plants in successive edi- 
tions of his Gardener’s Dictionary and as Stearn com- 
municates, “‘when there is no specimen extant from 
Miller’s own herbarium. .. . the application of a Miller 
name can often be determined or checked by a contem- 
porary specimen from the Chelsea Garden, even though 
such a specimen was not dried and labelled by Miller 
himself.” 
There are, in my possession, excellent photographs of 
two authentic specimens of Datura inoawia cultivated at 
the Chelsea Garden and kindly sent by J. fk. Dandy of 
the British Museum. Having examined these, I hereby 
designate as neotype the specimen listed in the Philo- 
sophical Transactions (of the Royal Society) 51 (1760) 
99, no. 1845. 
Since Datura novia and D. meteloides are identical, 
the former binomial which has priority must be taken 
up for this concept. 
