416 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION I). 



greater service to science than its describer, wlien he either puts 

 it into a wrong place or throws it into any of those chaotic heaps 

 miscalled genera with which systematic works still abound." The 

 practice recommended by Saccardo, and generally followed, seems 

 to ine to depart from the binomial system, and really to introduce 

 a trinomial one, for there is involved in it the old generic name, 

 as indicated by the author's name in parentheses, and the new one 

 adopted. So I simply give the authority for the actual name 

 adopted, introducing a slight mod'fication to distinguish betw'een 

 the original describer and the correct classifier. The name of the 

 former is always given in Roman characters, while that of the 

 latter is in italics. 



The necessity for appending authors' names at all has been 

 questioned, and by no less an authority than the late Charles 

 Darwin, as he considered that attaching for perj^etuity the name 

 of the first describer to species gave a direct premium to hasty 

 work, to naming instead of describin'j. However, we must have 

 names, and to indicate e.xactly the object to which the name was 

 applied iiy the author thereof we require to give the authority 

 for the name, at, least for the present, in systematic works. As 

 H. Strickland, M.A., F.R.S., wrote in reply to Darwin: — '-The 

 object of appending the name of a man to the name of a species 

 is not to gratify the vanity of the man, but to indicate more 

 precisely the species." But some attach more importance to an 

 authority for a name than others. If it implies that the author of 

 a name has contributed to our scientific knowledge of that 

 particular species, as when he fixes a new genus for it, then the 

 authority for the name is an important part of it. But if a name 

 be regarded, as Dr. Masters regards it, as a mere label, in itself 

 of no intrinsic consequence, then " in selecting a name that 

 which is most generally iised and most generally convenient should 

 be retained." The diversity of naming is becoming so mixed that 

 I believe it will ultimately come to this : that some standard list 

 will be recognised, and the names distinguised by numbers rather 

 than by authors'' names. 



At the present time there is a yearning on the part of botanists 

 to have some better understanding as to the principles on which 

 nomenclature should be based, so as to prevent or, at least, to stay 

 the drift towards confusion. To bring about, if possible, a uniform 

 system of nomenclature, and to prevent the multiplication of 

 synomyms, a circular letter has been issued by a committee of 

 Berlin botanists, including such well-known names as Professors 

 Engler and Ascherson. They propose four resolutions, which refer 

 only to the genera. 



1 , The starting point of the priority of the genera as well as the 

 species is the year 1752 resp. 1753. The starting point of 

 botanical nomenclature must be settled if there is to be uniformity 

 in our naming, and the different dates suggested are the 



