378 RETROSPECTIVE CRITICISM. \March, 



EETEOSPECTIVE CEITICISM. 



In tlie December number of the ' Phytologist/ p. 288, tbere is 

 a communication from your correspondent, the Rev. Hugh Mac- 

 millan, on the botany of Cleish Castle, etc., in which he re- 

 marks on the supposed similarity of Hahenaria albida and H. 

 chlorantha, and gives various diagnostics by which they may be 

 respectively recognized. May I be allowed to ask if this is a 

 slip of the pen, or an error arising from momentary forgetful- 

 ness ? Surely he cannot mean that such very dissimilar plants 

 as the two above mentioned can ever be mistaken for each 

 other ! Has he not mistaken H. albida for H. bifolia, which does 

 very much resemble H. chlorantha, and from which it can indeed 

 be only distinguished by the very diagnostics he gives. I was 

 rather hoping and expecting to have seen an explanatory note of 

 his own in this month's ' Phytologist,' but as none such has ap- 

 peared, I trust he will excuse my calling his attention to what 

 I cannot construe into anything else than a strange error. 



May I also be allowed to express my conviction that the good 

 cause which we have both at heart, \dz. that of rendering bota- 

 nical science interesting to those who cannot penetrate into all 

 the mysteries of scientific nomenclature, cannot be advanced by 

 the employment of such strange compovmds as ''autochthonous/' 

 on page 291. Of course when we really want a word to express 

 in a few letters what now requires three or fovn* words, as in the 

 case of the recent invention of the word " telegram," it is then 

 fair enough to construct on classic principles such a word as we 

 require; but it is impossible to prove the necessity that exists 

 for the introduction of a word like autochthonous, when our vo- 

 cabulary already contains " native " and " indigenous," either of 

 which would suit equally well for the purpose. J. B. 



In the ' Phytologist ' for January of the present year, at page 

 312, 1 read : ''Do you know if Dry as octopetala is in print as a 

 North Wales (Caernarvonshire) plant before?" The following 

 has just met my eye; and as the writer of the communication in 

 which the above inquiry is raised, will no doubt be glad to be 



