Igor | BRIEFER ARTICLES 365 
and Professor Britton has said “it is perfectly clear that as long as 
we allow ourselves a choice of names im any way, so long will authors 
ditfer in their acceptance and the settling of this important matter be 
deferred” [italics ours].* From these assertions the only logical 
conclusion is that doubtful cases are to be referred to the principle of 
priority. The decision between Buda and Tissa, and the determination 
of the generic type both “allow .... a choice of names,” and 
according to the first principle of the Rochester Code priority alone 
should settle them. The question of Buda and Tissa is one of decision 
between two generic names for the same plant; the question of the 
generic type asks which of two or more plants shall bear a given 
generic name. When these questions have such fundamental simi- 
larity, how can a reformer maintain that priority is to decide in one 
case and not in the other ? 
When Professor Britton now maintains that the first species of a 
complex genus is not necessarily the type, and that in such cases the 
Rochester code allows us to cling to the traditional genera, he at once 
places himself on record as likewise opposed to the fourth rule of the 
Rochester Code. This rule reads : 
IV. Homonyms.—The publication of a generic name or a binomial 
invalidates the use of the same name for any subsequently published genus 
Or species respectively. 
Let us look, for example, at the case of Mimosa, a name which 
Professor Britton and other reformers use in its traditional sense. 
The Linnzean Mimosa, published in the Species Plantarum, contained 
39 species, the first on page 516, the last on page 523. Of these 
Species only six are now retained in the genus as finally defined “y 
entham in 1875 and now generally accepted. The first species now 
recognized in the Benthamian genus Mimosa is M. viva, no. 11 of 
the Species Plantarum. This species is the last one on page 517, and 
on that page it is preceded by six species, and on page 516 by four 
Species, all of which are now treated as members of other genera If 
Tissa has priority over Buda “for the simple reason that ie scans 
first on the page,” then surely by the same logic Mimosa bigemina 
and the other five species on page 517 have priority over M7. vrva. 
And still more clearly J. viva is preceded by M. Ledédeck (now treated 
as an Albizzia) and the other species on page 516. Mimosa was pub- 
lished on this page (516) of the Species Plantarum as the name of a 
™ Jour. Bot. 28: 372. 1890. 
