
Igor] NOMENCLATORIAL PRINCIPLES 187 
satisfaction to know that at least one follower of the Rochester 
Code is ready to show us the actual task and the enormous 
upsetting of names consequent upon a conscientious and logical 
working out of the principle of strict priority. 
In Mr. Heller’s Catalogue many of the names accepted are 
not those which can be used consistently by authors who are 
committed to the Rochester Code. When that code was pro- 
posed it was professedly with the purpose of establishing 
uniformity in our nomenclature. As an outgrowth of its adop- 
tion by some American botanists the Botanical Club Check List 
was issued, a list which aimed to give us the names which our 
northeastern plants must henceforth bear according to the 
rulings of strict priority principles. That publication gave us 
the first tangible result upon which to base our estimate of the 
workings of the code; and though by some thoughtful and con- 
servative students the book and the principles represented by it 
were carefully discussed, by other botanists the publication was 
hailed as “the sign that the day of ‘authority’ as such is ended, 
and the day of ‘law’ has begun,”? and we were informed that 
“even the most obscure botanist is nowadays entitled to know 
why an old plant comes out under a new name... . and that 
their [the compilers of the Check List] work is plain work, the 
plain and straightforward statement of facts.” ® 
It is pertinent, then, for ‘the most obscure botanist” to ask 
about some of the names now (at least at the time of this 
writing) in vogue among those who champion the Rochester 
Code, and we may be permitted to inquire of those who have 
been instrumental in bringing about the present ‘uniformity ” 
how they account for a few of the names in their pages. Ref- 
erence has already been made to Professor Underwood's treat- 
ment of the ferns partially adopted by Mr. Heller in his Cata- 
dogue. In Britton and Brown’s Jilustrated Flora, published in 
1896, 59 species of true ferns are recognized, and the names, we 
are told, are those authorized by the Rochester Code. But 
in Professor Underwood’s latest treatment more than 25 per 
7,8 Bessey, C. E.: Am. Nat. 29: 350. 
