ORCHIDACE^ 



the magnitude of a difference rather than its constancy. Some 

 thirty-two thousand personal judgments have characterized the 

 history of the genus in systematic botany, and of these about 

 eleven thousand have withstood conscientious scrutiny and the 

 test of time. In other words, the generic synonymy that we en- 

 counter in systematic work among plants records a surprising 

 disregard of genera that have been too loosely defined or too 

 hastily proposed or that rest on decisions which ignore the prac- 

 tical application of taxonomy. 



In genera comparable to Spiranthes — genera that have been 

 retained in their broadest sense, although made up of very unlike 

 elements — the limits imposed by an historical and traditional 

 past seem almost sacrosanct. Of course, such groups should not 

 be maintained forever as heterogeneous assemblages because they 

 have been so maintained in the past. Such a procedure would 

 effectually put an end to progress. But when dismemberment of 

 such genera as Spiranthes results in difficulties of interpretation 

 and gives rise to a situation in which a working botanist is shifted 

 from one exasperating perplexity to another, his final state of 

 mind being uncertainty as to the accuracy of his diagnosis, then 

 dismemberment is inadvisable. If one of these large genera is to 

 be dismembered, it is fair to expect that proposed changes will 

 be published only after a reasonably long period of probation in 

 the hands of their author. 



It is not my intention to review Dr. Schlechter's monograph of 

 the Spiranthinae in these pages, but having criticized it, a single 

 example to substantiate my position may suffice. 



Spiranthes novaezelandiae Hook, f., a species in facies similar 

 to S. sinensis (Pers.) Ames, is characterized in part by the appar- 

 ent suppression of the rostellum. It would, I think, be described 



as erostellate by the majority of botanists. The pollinia appear 



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