106 THE CITATION OF BOTANICAL AUTHORITIES. 



we know he died in 1778 ; but I have heard no captious criticism 

 upon that point. 



To me it appears as if the double function of the author's name 

 appended to the specific and generic names had been lost sight 

 of when the objectionable Article was drafted. If it bears the 

 semblance of homage, it must also bear the weight of responsibility. 

 If Koch, when describing Orchis Traunsteineri, states " (Sauter in 

 litt.),'' it is clear that he repudiates the idea of being considered 

 its father. What would be thought in private life of persistently 

 giving a name to a child which was openly denounced by its 

 father ? 



The " bibliographical help" plea may also be pushed too far. 

 In Loudon's ' Encyclopaedia of Plants ' there are many Linnean 

 species with " W." appended to them — that is, a "bibliographical 

 help" is given to show that a description will be found in Will- 

 denow's edition of the ' Species Plantarum.' But will any reason- 

 able man demand that this plan should be again reverted to ? 



I think Dr. Asa Grray's position on this question is the true 

 one. It practically amounts to this, that because Smith happens 

 to lodge with Jones, and comes out of his street door, we do not 

 call him Jones, and insist that he must so style himself, because 

 otherwise the local directories and parish records will fail to indi- 

 cate his whereabouts. 



In fine, my contention is that Art. 50, so far as relates to its 

 first clause, was virtually stillborn ; from the date of its promul- 

 gation scarcely any one has followed it, whilst numberless writers 

 have gone contrary to it. I consider, therefore, that it falls under 

 Art. 4, clause 3 : — " In the absence of rule, or where the conse- 

 quences of rules are questionable, established custom becomes law.'' 



B. Daydon Jackson. 



When we forwarded the ms. of our "Notes on British Characece'' 

 to the Editor, he assured us that, to the best of his belief, in citing 

 as the authority for a species the author who first published a 

 description, and not him who is supposed to have first used the 

 name in ms., we stood alone among British botanists. We think 

 it therefore desirable to state the reasons which appear to us to 

 necessitate this course, viz., that the quotation of the ms. author 

 as the authority is extremely inconvenient in practice and strictly 

 inaccurate in statement. 



In the first place, we maintain, as followers of the binomial 

 system of nomenclature, that the authority does not form part of 

 the name, but that the addition is only made for convenience of 

 reference to the original description,''' as two similar names, with 

 different authorities, cannot exist, the later being necessarily invalid. 



* It seems necessary to state this, as some botanists have held that the 

 authority does form pnrt of the name, and some have even gone so far as to 

 purposely omit the comma between the name and the authority, a course 

 which we think cannot be too strongly condemned, as introducing trinomial 

 names composed of mixed languages. 



