56 



simply an answer to my real question, further discussion of the sub- 

 ject might have been better dropped between us ; since any competent 

 botanist might then have been considered in a position to estimate 

 the sufficiency of the reply. Unfortunately, the intended answer 

 shoots far wide of the question, through the mystification of including 

 two different things under one name only. For this reason, I feel 

 called to self-defence still. 



I had stated certain characters (Phytol. ii. 1029) whereby Forster's 

 Viola flavicornis differs from Smith's Viola flavicornis; and I then 

 asked whether characters could be shown, whereby the disputed 

 "Surrey violet" differs from Smith's V. flavicornis "to an equal 

 degree ? — or to any describable degree ? " Mr. Forster replies to the 

 latter moiety of the question, by saying that his two specimens of 

 the " Surrey violet " differ from a specimen of the " dwarf violet " 

 {Forster 1 s flavicornis) in the form of their leaves. Thus, while I am 

 asking for a distinction between A and B, Mr. Forster replies by 

 stating a difference between A and C. No doubt this evading answer 

 was made with perfect sincerity of intention, but it cannot be com- 

 mended for its logic. 



In contrasting A and C, however, Mr. Forster uses the words " as 

 described by Smith," which are sufficient to intimate that B {Smith's 

 Viola flavicornis) was not wholly absent from his ideas at the time, 

 although confused with and subordinate to C {Forster's Viola flavicor- 

 nis). I may presume, he intended to say that the difference which he 

 finds between A and C, does also exist between A and B. On this 

 presumption, I am to infer that Mr. Forster considers me wrong in re- 

 ferring the "Surrey violet" to Smith's flavicornis, because the leaves 

 of the latter are said to be cordate, obtuse ; whereas those of two spe- 

 cimens of the former are " ovate-lanceolate, not heart-shaped, though 

 it is true that on one of them a leaf or two show a very slight tenden- 

 cy at the base to become so." (Mr. Forster s words). 



Now, the leaves of the violets allied to V. canina are well known 

 to be very polymorphous ; and therefore I should scarcely have anti- 

 cipated that so experienced a botanist as Mr. Forster would adduce 

 this single character of two individual specimens, as a " describable 

 degree" of difference between two alleged species, without previous 

 inquiry about the constancy of the character. The two specimens 

 sent to Mr. Forster, were such as I had loose by me at the time, and 

 could I have foreseen the use which he would make of them, I should 

 have warned him that two specimens could not show all the varia- 

 tions of form to be found in the leaves of the species to which they 



