70 REVIEW—BOTANICAL LOCALITY RECORD CLUB. 
There is a reflection which cannot but be forced upon the miad 
of one who reads these reports, even if he has not already come to the 
same conclusion from his own experience, in regard to the minute 
differences of many segregate species. The botanical world is divided 
into two great camps, each other’s mortal foes, the ‘‘ Lumpers” and the 
‘‘ Splitters.” The latter discovered the inconsistency of many of the 
views held by the former about species, and there is no doubt their 
discovery was a genuine one. But in their anxiety to avoid one extreme 
they have, not unnaturally, fallen into another. To prove this, one has 
only to observe the divergent conclusions often arrived at by two equally 
competent ‘‘ authorities” anent a common bramble-bush, or any of the 
other puzzling genera. The cause lies in the supposed necessity of 
assigning a name to every specimen which may be collected, and when, 
as happens now and then, some unusually perverse plant will not fit in 
with any described species, and the discoverer has not sufficient weight 
to force a new name upon it, it must forsooth be assigned to that to 
which it comes nearest. And of course different botanists may, and do, 
hold different opinions on that point. Many examples of this may be 
found in the pages of these reports, but the members are slow to adopt, 
or at least to express, the natural conclusion, namely, that these segregates 
are often only a selected few out of a continuous chain of forms. 
No botanist now believes in the old theory of fixed species ; all admit 
that Variation has acted to produce the many diverse types of plants. 
But, if so, it is still acting ; we know that when two species are separated 
by well-marked differences, it is only that the intermediate forms have 
disappeared, but there are cases in which the intermediate forms have not 
disappeared, in which species are forming under our very eyes. When 
we gather a Ranunculus, or an Hieracium, or a Rubus, which does not 
agree with any of the forms selected to be honoured with the title of 
species or sub-species, instead of doing violence to nature by (more or less 
arbitrarily) fixing on a name for it, we should rather admit the fact as it 
stands before us. As an example of what I mean, I will take a simple 
case. The old Glyceria fluitans is now divided into two species, G. fluitans 
and G. plicata, which differ considerably in some respects. But there 
.are also found certain intermediate forms, to some of which the name of 
pedicellata is given, and these are ranked as a variety of fluitans. A very 
slight search will, however, enable one to find some form which agrees 
entirely with none of these three; yet according to present practice nine 
out of ten botanists would inflict one or other of the names upon it. 
Somewhere may be read :—‘ A few naturalists deny the existence 
of those intermediate forms which the theory of Variation requires; but 
practical field-workers know that they exist, and are a puzzle and a 
torment to the collector.” This is a false view; they are no torment 
when their true meaning is recognised, and we give up the vain attempt 
to bind infinite Nature in our narrow bonds of ‘described species.” In 
the minute investigation of these varying forms lies the key to much 
that now puzzles us in the theory of Variation. 
The Botanical Locality Record Club has during the last two 
years been making efforts to extend its work to the lower 
