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tition in laborious and patient investigation of details, upon which all reliable 

 conclusions must be founded. To them we practically owe the greater 

 number of important compilations, genera and species, nomenclature and 

 indexes requiring steady labour, with results not brUliant but useful. Again, 

 if the French are good theorists, the Germans are great speculators. If French 

 theories may sometimes be found defective in detail, so German imagination 

 is apt to wander too far from the facts with which it started. And this 

 comparison of French method and German detail, of French theory and 

 German speculation, will be probably found exemplified not only in their 

 physiological researches and elementary works, but also in their monographs 

 and other systematic publications. You learn more rapidly from a French- 

 man ; the German supplies you with more materials for study ; and thus you 

 derive equal benefit from both. " 



While I quite agree generally in the truth of the above remarks, I 

 would ask whether this esi^ecial attention to minute details, for which the 

 Germans have so high a reputation, is not often attended with certain incon- 

 veniences — whether the habit of dwelling on slight distinctions is not apt to 

 give them in the student's mind a higher degree of importance than they 

 really deserve, and whether it does not lead to the evil results which I am 

 about to bring before you ? 



A second supplement to Herr Fiickel's Symbolae Mycologi* has just 

 appeared. In his introduction, the author says that one great object he had 

 in view in his earlier work was to present to the reader every fact which 

 seemed of interest, and especially anything which appeared new as regards 

 the Hmitation of genera and species. He says that he has followed generally 

 the principles of Tulasne and De Bary, using them, however, in subordination 

 to his own judgment ; thus, for instance, he declines to follow De Bary 

 with regard to the Myxomycetes, considering them as a transition from animals 

 to vegetables. Speaking of his own new genera, he acknowledges that his 

 characters are very often slight and insufficient ; but he alleges, in excuse, the 

 imperfection of our knowledge of the various phases of fruit-formation in such 

 genus or species. He considers, notwithstanding, that the only way to avoid 

 grouping together heterogenous species is to constitute new genera. The 

 question here arises — To what length is this to be carried? for it may be 

 extended so far as to create a new genus for each individual, inasmuch as 

 two distinct species always differ in some material point from each other, and 

 it remains for an author to use his judgment as to what differences should be 

 considered of generic value. A genus, unlike a species, is merely an arbitrary 

 distinction, made for the convenience of the student, and the question is 

 whether the great multiplication of genera does not rather tend to confuse 

 the science than to render it easier or more comprehensible. Since writing 

 the above, an excellent resume of Fiickel's classification of Sphosriaeci, by 

 Mr. Plowright, has appeared in the September number of "Grevillea," in 

 which, I think, the reviewer coincides in a great measure with what I 



