OPEN LEti Go, 
THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 
UNDER THE TITLE of “The American Botanist, vol. I, no. 1” a four- 
page octavo leaflet was issued September 15, 1896. While no place of 
publication is stated, the editor of this newly launched periodical gives his 
temporary address as the Gray Herbarium, Cambridge, Mass. It is true that 
he has received such facilities of reference to books and specimens as are 
usually accorded to visiting botanists, but to prevent a possible misunder- 
standing, it seems necessary to state that his publication has no official con- 
nection whatever with this establishment.—B. L. Ropinson, Curator of Gray 
erbartum. 
ESCHSCHOLTZIA MEXICANA-PARVULA. 
ESCHSCHOLTZIA finds its extreme eastern limit in the Organ mountains 
of New Mexico, and the adjacent region about El Paso. The pretty little 
species there found, which I have had occasion to study in connection with 
its bee-visitors, is commonly known as £. Mexicana Greene, Bull. Cal. Ac. 
Sci. 1 : 69. 1885. 1 want to know why it is not to be designated Z. farvuda 
(A. Gray), for it is assuredly the £. Douglasii var. parvula Gray, Plante 
Wrightiane 2: 10. 1853. The few words of description given by Gray, with 
the locality, readily identify the plant. There is no other parvuda of prior 
date. Is it not just a little absurd to refuse to recognize a name fora species, 
because first applied in a varietal sense? Such a course seems hardly to 
accord with a Darwinian conception of species, nor is it supported by the 
codes of nomenclature. : 
Another principle which is generally recognized, in zoology at any rate, is 
that the specific name must be at least as old as the names applied to vari- 
eties of the species. Thus it will sometimes happen that the type form of a 
species is by no means the commonest form ; it may be quite a rare variety. 
On Darwinian grounds I see no objection to this, as the oldest (and therefore 
true) type of a variable species is hard to ascertain, and the probabilities are 
perhaps against its being the most common. 
It follows from the above that Philibertella Hartwegii (Vail, 1897) hetero- 
phylia (Engelm., 1856-7), as given in Bull. Torrey Bot. Club 24 : 308. 1897, 
will not do, The species must stand as Philibertella heterophylla (Engelm.), 
and the Hartwegii form, if properly belonging to the same species, can be 
treated as a variety.—T. D. A. CocKERELL, Mesilla Park, NLM. 
1898] 
