190 EETUEN TO ENGLAND : AND VISIT TO PAEIS 



Such scrubs as that Pol[ysiphonia] [he declares to Harvey] 

 are rather infra dig. for an ' officer and a gentleman.' Cannot 

 you spare some of those dandy Delesseria, or some showy 

 things that will require a whole red plate ? I do hate too 

 much of this sort of thing, but I think they ought to come 

 in. (April 14, 1845.) 



Harvey carried out his wishes, for not only is there a 

 Polysiphonia Davisii, but two Delesserias are named D. 

 Davisii and D. Lyallii. 



Meantime details are scrutinised ; carelessness about species 

 ruthlessly exposed. D'Urville's collection assigns a certain 

 Alga to Lord Auckland's Island, where it was inconceivable 

 that Hooker and Lyall should have overlooked it. He reminds 

 Harvey how he proved in Paris that specimens were wrongly 

 ticketed, and as for the so-called species itself (Ehodomenia 

 ornata), which Brown enters as Ballia Hombroniana, ' I am 

 convinced,' he writes, ' of its being no species at all, and long 

 to restore the name callitricha, but " am not game " ! ' 

 Similarly, in an undated letter of 1845 : 



I am now hammer and tongs at my Lichens, which are 

 an Augean stable. The British species are humbugged by 

 the introduction of varieties ; if ever I publish an Ed. of 

 Eng. Bot. I shall not hesitate to cut down Usnea and 

 Kamalina to one species, all the intermediate forms of every- 

 day occurrence. 



