;SKETCH OP THE CONIFERS OF JAPAN. 643 



no doubt, Dr. Liudley was led to the conclusion, that this could 

 not be the same tree. Accordingly, when Fortune's plant 

 arrived from North-east China, " Kara," he not unfairly supposed 

 that the name " Kara Matz " was descriptive and not appella- 

 tive, and that bemg a Larch, or allied to the Lai'ch, it might be 

 Kosmpfer's tree ; but with less reason, finding that the scales in 

 it had a pyramidal outline, he assumed that the meaniug attached 

 by Ksempfer to mtclei might be scales, instead of its legitimate 

 interpretation, seeds. 



The specimens brought by Mi\ Veitch remove the imputation 

 upon Kaempfer's Latinity, which this might infer, and show that, as 

 far as his short description goes, it entirely corresponds with the 

 characters of Abies Leptolepis. Both are called Kara Mats; 



Coniferi^,''^ both have ^'nucleos pjramidatos,^^ 



We 



f^ 



Wf^ 



Lambert in 1832, has a long priority over Siebold's Ahie» 

 Leptolepis; the latter is the first recognisable description, and 

 with all deference to the reforming purists, we insist that a 

 name to be entitled to the honours of priority, must either itself 

 be founded on what can be honestly called a description, or if not, 

 must have been adopted by some one who has supplied that 

 deficiency. » 



Abies K(Bm]yfer% of Lindley, would therefore appear as yet to 

 have no right to a place in the Japanese Flora ; but as it has 

 acquired a sort of prescriptive title at least to be noticed in such 

 a Flora, and it may be that the view of its synonymy above 

 taken is erroneous, we proceed to describe it under protest, that 

 we do so merely as a Chinese species, which may be hereafter, 

 but which we do not believe to have yet been, found in Japan. 



Pseudo-Laeix"-^ IviEMPFERi. — Sul-Gcn. 



• '^Tbis 13 an ill phrase — a vile plirase. Pseudo-larix is a vile phrase.'* 

 It is half Latin and half Greek to begin with. Then its meaning, ** false 

 larch," is untrue; — Nature produces nothing false —and if she did, this is 

 not a false larch. It would be as reasonable to say that the larch is a false 

 Pseudo-larix. But even although nothing more were meant to be implied by 

 the name than '* allied to the larch/' or " like the larch," it -would not be 

 without exception. The tree has other alliances besides the larch. The 

 name should, and no doubt will, be changed ; but we have so great a dis- 

 like to changing nameS; even where they are bad, that we leave it to some 

 other hand to do. 



