108 THE CITATION OF BOTANICAL AUTHORITIES. 



line between those wliicli another author has chanced to take up 

 and publish, and those which have been disregarded and the plants 

 re -named ? 



The objection raised to the system of quotation we advocate, 

 that it would involve the alteration of the generally accepted 

 authorities of many species, we do not think worth consideration, 

 as, if it is allowed that the plan is good for the future, we must not 

 let temporary inconvenience stand in the way of permanent ex- 

 pediency ; and after all, it would chiefly affect those who do not 

 take the trouble to look up original descriptions, but content them- 

 selves with second-hand quotations. If Linnaeus and his generation 

 had considered that the inconvenience to them should outweigh a 

 permanent good, we should not have had a binomial nomenclature. 



It appears to us that the quotation, as the authority, of the first 

 publisher of the name, with a description, does the least amount of 

 injustice to the parties concerned and to the botanical world at 

 large, and is the only standing ground, other than quoting the first 

 discriminator of the s]3ecies, under whatever genus he placed it, or 

 by whatever name he called it. 



Henry & James Groves. 



The difficulty of deciding what names were published by Mr. 

 Brown in the ' Hortus Kewensis ' is to a very great extent removed 

 by the republication, in the ' Miscellaneous Works of Kobert 

 Brown,' of all his contributions to that work. The * Miscellaneous 

 Works ' were collected and edited by Mr. Brown's colleague, Mr. 

 J. J. Bennett, who was of course well acquainted with the part Mr. 

 Brown had taken in the ' Hortus Kewensis.' 



Sprengel (1818) uses the name Mathiola, altering the spelling to 

 llatthiola, and quoting it as ' K. Brown emend.' ; A. P. DeCandoUe 

 (Syst. Nat. ii. 162, 1821), retaining the original spelhng, attributes 

 the genus to Brown, as every one has since done. The fact, there- 

 fore, of Mr. Brown's connection with the name is obvious enough ; 

 and it was fully recognised by his contemporaries. The work of 

 the Aitons was confined to making a catalogue of the plants of 

 Kew Gardens, the botanical portion of the ' Hortus Kewensis ' 

 being contributed by Solander to the first edition, and by Dryander 

 and Brown to the second. 



The omission of "the comma between the name and the 

 authority," to which the Messrs. Groves take exception, is all but 

 universal among continental authors. But it does not follow that 

 •' trinomial names composed of mixed languages " would result ; for 

 the name of the author, if written in full, would probably be 

 Tjatinised, and in the genitive case, e.g., " Bellis perennis Linnai.' 

 I do not quite accej)t the Messrs. Groves' statement of my views 

 in their first paragraph. 



James Britten. 



