August 18, 1905.] 



SCIENCE. 



219 



votes more than a majority came from Ger- 

 many, Austria, Switzerland and Belgium; 

 only two English delegates attended and the 

 Eoyal Gardens at Kew were not represented 

 in the voting; twelve delegates were present 

 from the United States, casting about 30 

 votes. The actual voting was by means of 

 printed ballots, except in the ease of proposi- 

 tions which developed no debate, which were 

 adopted viva voce. 



Dr. Otto Kuntze, whose writings on the 

 subject of botanical nomenclature have been 

 the most voluminous, was not a delegate, nor 

 were his views represented, inasmuch as he 

 regards the appointment of the international 

 commission at Paris as irregular, the pre- 

 ponderating vote of the central European 

 countries as unfair, and the whole congress 

 as incompetent to reach an international re- 

 sult. He appeared before one of the meetings 

 and read a protest, distributing at the same 

 time a printed document in support of his 

 contentions. No opportunity for work by 

 committees was permitted by the controlling 

 vote, one subject only being permitted to go 

 to conference, and on this one unanimity was 

 reached; attempts were made to reopen sev- 

 eral propositions supported by a large minor- 

 ity, in the hope that mutual concessions would 

 lead to further unanimity, but the majority 

 refused to permit this course to be taken; no 

 attempt whatever was made to approach zoo- 

 logical usage. 



The details of the rules and recommenda- 

 tions approved by the congress must await the 

 publication of the official reports; meanwhile, 

 the following general results may be men- 

 tioned : 



1. Consideration of the nomenclature of the 

 cellular cryptogams (Thallophytes and Bryo- 

 phytes) was referred to a commission to re- 

 port to the next international congress, to be 

 lield in Brussels in 1910. 



2. The nomenclature of fossil plants was 

 referred to another commission to report at 

 the same time. 



3. The congress was nearly unanimously in 

 favor of establishing the date of departure 

 ior the names of both genera and species with 



the publication of Linnaeus' ' Species Plan- 

 tarum,' 1753. 



4. Uniform terminations for orders, fam- 

 ilies, tribes and other ranks, were unanimously 

 agreed upon. 



5. The stability of the specific name, when 

 the species is transferred from one genus to 

 another, was essentially unanimously ap- 

 proved, only two votes being cast against it, 

 but when the rank is changed the preservation 

 of the name was not made necessary; the only 

 exception to this general rule was made in the 

 case of double names, such as Linaria linaria, 

 the vote being 116 to 72. 



6. The congress approved a method of de- 

 terraining the generic name when an old 

 genus is divided, essentially as it was laid 

 down at the Paris congress of 1867, no ad- 

 vance being made on this line, and no pro- 

 vision being made for the establishment of 

 generic types, althoiigh the vote on this ques- 

 tion was 106 to 74. 



7. Althoiigh having adopted unanimously 

 as a leading article, a principle to the effect 

 that the rules of nomenclature must not be 

 arbitrary, the congress by a large majority 

 voted to approve the exception of more than 

 400 generic names from the operation of all 

 nomenclatorial rules, a list of such names 

 submitted by Herr Harms of Berlin being 

 adopted; the congress thus went on record as 

 not regarding priority as a very important 

 .general principle. It was also maintained 

 that other names may be added to this list 

 in the future. 



8. The congress approved, by a vote of 105 

 to 88, the requirement that after January 1, 

 1908, in order to constitute valid publication, 

 a new name must be accompanied by a diag- 

 nosis in Latin, this not applying, however, 

 to woi'ks already in course of publication. 



9. The congress voted against the principle 

 of the rejection of all homonyms better known 

 to zoologists as the principle of ' once a 

 synonym always a synonym,' thus failing to 

 recognize this as an important aid in securing 

 the stability of names. 



10. The metric measurements were strongly 

 recommended by a unanimous vote. 



]Sr. L. Britton. 



