ira LELIERS. 
ANOTHER QUESTION OF NOMENCLATURE. 
THE receipt of Mr. G. B. Sudworth’s Check-List of the Forest Trees of 
the United States (U. S. Dept. Agriculture), stirs me up to make a protest 
against a nomenclatural heresy which seems to find favor in certain quarters. 
It is this: that a varietal name must be changed if it occurs elsewhere in the 
genus, even as the name of another species, or of a variety of another spectés. 
This doctrine does not seem to me to be justified by the codes, nor is it con- 
ducive to the stability of varietal names. I have for many years had a good 
deal to do with the varietal nomenclature of animals, particularly mollusca, 
and have always considered it commendable to give the same name (é. 2+ 
minor, alba, elongata, hirsuta, etc.) to similar variations of different species. 
This plan is widely accepted among zoologists, and is found advantageous in 
every way. The first time I noticed any general application of the contrary 
plan was when I received Bull. 9 of the Minnesota Botanical Studies. o this 
work (1894) Mr. E. P. Sheldon proposes ten varietal names in Astragalus, all 
of which I consider quite needless. Mr. Sudworth, in his Nomenclature of 
the Arborescent Flora of the United States (1897), and again in the above- 
mentioned Check-List, has followed the same doctrine, and has made sixty- 
six substitutions of new names for old, which I think should not be accepted. 
He has also made a number of other substitutions which rest on other grounds, 
and are apparently valid. 
It is particularly important to decide at this time what we are going to 
do about the doctrine here discussed, because Mr. Sudworth has very excel- 
lently prepared a revised nomenclature of the cultivated varieties of our native 
trees, and unless some protest is made, it will doubtless become current as it 
stands. The desirability of a correct nomenclature for cultivated plants need 
not be urged, nor need it be pointed out that it must be for botanists = 
decide, eventually, what system shall be adopted. The system introduced by 
Mr. Sudworth, if supported, will logically compel us to make a review of 
varietal nomenclature in many other groups, productive of much incon- 
venience, and, as I believe, of no good 
good. : : 
append herewith a list of the Sheldonian names in the work cited, which 
‘ Age : I 
I would reject, giving the corrected nomenclature in the second column. ey 
have also prepared a list of the Sudworthian names, but it is too long to prin 
here, 
[DECEMBER 
436 
