BOTANICAL NOMENCLATURE. 361 



and 2, an increasing recognition of the law of priority as the 

 fundamental i:)rinciple of nomenclature, and as prevailino- 

 over considerations of elegance, linguistic purity, and precise 

 meaning. But some recent publications of individual bot- 

 anists look the other way; notably so two publications by 

 Saint-Lager, " Reforme de la Nomenclature Botanique," and 

 " Nouvelles Remarques sur la Nomenclature Botanique," pub- 

 lished at Lyons, in the Annals of the Botanical Society of 

 that city ; of which it may be said, that the reflex effect of 

 the multitudinous changes proposed in the view of makino- 

 old and accepted names better, more classical, or more signifl- 

 cant, has greatly strengthened the hands of those who contend 

 for the absolute fixity and unalterableness of published names. 

 Whether and to what extent misspelled or otherwise wrongly 

 formed names may be corrected, and whether in some cases 

 the principle of fixity should not prevail over absolute priority, 

 are matters which may be discussed further on. We take uj) 

 in the author's order the points which we wish to specify or 

 to comment on. 



Article 6 of the code declares tliat " scientific names should 

 be in Latin. When taken from another lanofuaofe, a Latin 

 termination is given to them except in some cases sanctioned 

 by custom." Here our author asks, " But what is Latin ? " 

 He concludes that the Latin of Linn sens should be the model. 

 It is the classical language of botany, and is much more pre- 

 cise than the Latin of antiquity, in wliich very many words 

 bear two, three, or half a dozen senses, either in the same or 

 in different ages ; while in the technical language of botany 

 each word has but one meaning, and each idea or object is ex- 

 pressed by a single term. De Candolle elaborated this point 

 in his " Phytographie," to which he refers for illustrations ; 

 and he returns to it in special applications when commenting 

 on article QQ^ as w^e shall see. But, in fact, even technical 

 language cannot always avoid ambiguities and the use of 

 words in senses which have to be determined by the context. 

 Folium^ for example, in botanical descrij^tion, may mean the 

 blade of a leaf only, or this along with its petiole, or blade 

 with petiole and stipules together, or it may even mean any 

 homologue of the ordinary leaf. 



