NOTES ON NEW AND OLD GENERA 1 95 



Cordus.' Linnaeus reduced the genus to his Osmunda,' and unfor- 

 tunately the first attempt at restoration of the name since 175.3 

 was made to apply mistakenly to Lomaria Spicant (Linn.) Desv.-' 

 Haller/ Scopoli,^ (Ludwig, Boehmer,)^ Weis,^ Trevisan,^ in fact 

 all the followers of Haller thought apparently that the plant 

 Valerius Cordus had at hand was Lomaria Spicant (Linn.) Desv., 

 and not more than a year ago a, goodly number of species new 

 and old were put under Struthiopteris though under former con- 

 ditions referable to Lomaria.^ Now, because of the "rules" that 

 tolerate an error or a mistake, when made since 1753, it would 

 be worse than useless to insist that the name Struthiopteris, be 

 applied to what is now called Matteucia, on the ground that the 

 former was the first pre-Linnaean name of the latter, with Haller 

 etc., to the contrary notwithstanding. Such an assumption of 

 position would appear ridiculous to code followers, who may be 

 expected to be logical or not as suits their whims. 



On the authority of Trevisan was it asserted even that the 

 original Struthiopteris Cordus is the Linnaean Osmunda Spicant. ^° 

 Trevisan like Haller and others must have put too much stock 

 in the figure accompanying Cordus' description, to the detriment 

 of careful study of his description, and all unmindful of the fact 

 that the figures and illustrations of Cordus' History were put in 

 by Conrad Gesner. The latter was not a very good botanist, 

 but rather a zoologist, and in editing the other's work long after 

 Cordus' death, added the figures, which in not a few cases were 

 lamentably mixed up, and often so hopelessly transposed that 

 even a botanical tyro in looking through the work must smile 

 at mistakes, realizing immediately after reading the remarkable 

 good descriptions of Cordus himself that this author could not 

 have been responsible for such obvious blunders. 



In confirmation of the fact that Cordus described the Ostrich 



1 Cordus, V. Hist. PI. 2, p. 170, (1561) edited by C. Gesner. 



2 Linnaeus, C, Sp. PI. p. 1066, (1753). 



3 Desvaux, A. N. Ges. Nat. Fr. Berl. Mag. 5, p. 325, (181 1). 



4 Haller, A. P^num Stirp. Helv. p. 132, (1742) also 2nd Ed. 3, p. 6, (1768). 



5 vScopoli, J. A., Fl. Car. p. 168, (1760). 



6 Ludwig Boehmer, Def. Gen. PI. p. 479, (1760) as a synonym, also 

 Gleditsch Fl. Pips. p. 296. 



7 Weiss, F. W., PI. Crypt. Fl. Gott. p. 286, (1770). 



8 Trevisan, V. C, Attis Tst. Yen. IIP, 14, pp. 553-558, (1869). 



9 Broadhurst, J. Bull. Torr. Bot. CI., 39, p. 257, (1912). 

 10 Thalius, J. vSylva Harcynia, p. 119, (1588). 



