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of the rusts, even by the foremost students of the order. It affects sys- 
tematic work adversely, keeps the terminology in an antiquated and ambig- 
uous form, and makes it difficult to institute legitimate comparisons be- 
tween different genera, species, or spore structures. 
One of the wrong conceptions, wrong when viewed in the light of 
present knowledge, is to make the genus Puccinia include all species that 
possess a two-celled, pedicelled and free teliospore (excepting those with 
teliospore imbedded in gelatinous matrix, separated under Gymnospor- 
angium), irrespective of the other morphological characters, or of the 
complexity of the life cycle, and furthermore, as part of the same concep- 
tion, to make the genus Uromyces include all species that possess the same 
kind of teliospore, only one-celled instead of two-celled. The writer be- 
lieves that the length and nature of the life cycle, which is a more unvary- 
ing character in the rusts than the one or two-celled teliospore (recall 
the Uromyces-Puccinia species on Allium, Sida, and some other hosts), 
should be accepted as a character for genera, as it is now quite generally 
accepted for species. Recognizing this as a valid generic character, and 
taken in connection with other characters, the genus Puccinia can be sep- 
arated into four genera (i. @., Dicwoma, Allodus, Bullaria, Dasyspora), 
and the genus Uromyces also into four (i.e., Nigredo, Uromycopsis, Kle- 
bahnia, Telospora). If other characters, as well as the life cycle, mostly 
now generally ignored, are taken into account, Puccinia Pruni-spinose and 
its allies should form a genus (T'ranzschelia) near to Ravenelia, on ace- 
count of the adherent pedicels of the teliospores and peculiar structure 
of the urediniospores; Uromyces rosicola, on account of its evident spore 
structure, will go into a genus (Ameris) near to Phragmidium, but with 
a more limited life cycle; Uromyces Terebinthi, and its allies, on account 
of the remarkably distinctive characters of both urediniospores and telio- 
spores, will form a genus somewhere between Ravenelia and Tranzschelia, 
while the similar Uromuces effusus, with a still more restricted life cycle, 
will go into another genus (Discospora). And in like manner quite a num- 
ber of other species now commonly included under Puccinia and Uromyces 
could properly be separated and distributed to other genera, with much 
improvement in the nomenclature and great clarification of the systematic 
affinities. Other genera beside Puecinia and Uromyces could also be shown 
to be overburdened with species whose life cycle, or morphological struc- 
ture, or both, entitle them to a different place in the systematic arrange- 
