NOTES ON NEW AND OLD GENERA i8i 



Trichlisperma Raf. Speech., I., p. 117, (18 14). 

 Poly gala Linn., segregate. 



Trichlisperma paucifolia (Willd.) Nwd. 



Trichlisperma grandiflora Raf. 1. c. 



Polygala paucifolia (Willd., Sp. PI. 3. p. 380, (1800). 



Polygala uniflora Michx., Fl. Bor. Am. 2, p. 53, (1893). 



Senega Spach. 



Polygala Senega Linn, has been separated as a genus and 

 perhaps a good one by Spach. as Senega officinalis Spach.' The 

 characters are not as notable as those of the plants already dis- 

 cussed. 



Acer Linn. 



The genus Acer has been left by phytographers even to the 

 present day in nearly the same condition as treated by Linnaeus 

 in 1753. Whether Rulac be segregated from it or not, it remains 

 an aggregate containing plants with simple and compound leaves, 

 plants that are dioecious and variously polygamous, flowers 

 hypogynous and perigynous, flowers with or without petals and 

 various kinds of perianth and difference in number of stamens, 

 sepals separate or united. Some groups have intra-staminal, 

 others extra-staminal disks. In fact, with Rulac removed from 

 Acer the latter still presents anomalies greater than if left in 

 because the segregation of the former only emphasizes the incon- 

 sistency of a procedure that disregards in this separation characters 

 more important than those that warrant us from considering 

 Rulac as distinct. All the above mentioned variations constant 

 in the groups manifest themselves at once to the student that 

 attempts to study the maples, and yet the aggregate genus is 

 left in this condition without apparently the slightest misgivings 

 on the part of modern botanists! Alost diagnoses of the manuals, 

 in fact, deftly gloss over the importance of the characters referred 

 to by either scarcely referring to them or leaving the superficial 

 student to deceive himself into believing they are variable 

 characters. 



About the only notable character that is made to hold this 

 Linnaean Acer unsegregated is the similarity of the fruit in all 

 the species. On the same principle of classification one would 



I Spach. E. Hist. Nat. Veg. Phan. 7, p. 129, (1S39). 



