106 Muhlenbergia, Volume 4 
gists, physiologists and ecologists has borne with them patiently 
and long, and has deferentially abided by the specific determi- 
nations of the taxonomists. The recent ebullitions of the tax- 
onomic radicals have evoked in botanists in general successively 
dissatisfaction, contempt and rage. These things will not be 
endured much longer; a little more and the sinning taxonomists 
will be ‘cast out into the outer darkness where there shall be 
wailing and gnashing of teeth.” 
We may perhaps be pardoned for having an inclination to 
wish that Dr. Cowles had shed more light on the casting out 
proposition. His ideas as to how it is to be done, and by whom, 
would be interesting. One infers that it will be done by “the 
world of morphologists, physiologists and ecologists.” Let us 
suppose that the taxonomists should all take a vacation for sev- 
eral years, all their specimens be locked up, and all the manuals 
and other books that in any way help to identify plants be spir- 
ited away. The complaining gentlemen would, I think, find 
themselves in a very bad way, and perhaps would also have to 
take a vacation. 
As it appears to me, the casting out will be done by the 
taxonomists themselves. A single example should suffice to 
prove the point. The sixth edition of Gray’s Manual (as well 
as the fifth, which I used as a beginner) was far from being 
what it should have been, and the dissatisfaction with it led to 
the issuing of a work from another source which more nearly 
met the requirements. This new work raised the standard, and 
now after very many years we have in the recently issued sey- 
enth edition of ‘““Gray’s Manual,” a book worthy of the name. 
One can not help feeling that the ecologist especially is 
very unreasonable. He apparently can get along with genera 
only, or with a few species and an innumerable lot of ‘“‘varie- 
ties.” But the taxonomist needs species in his business, and 
must also make use of descriptions in order to show wherein one 
lot of plants differs from another. The ecologist has, however, 
