622 



Garden and Forest. 



[December 25, 1889. 



(vol. ii., 170, Paris, 1809), showing that this was well under- 

 stood at the time. 



]5ut, as I have elsewhere contended, Raiinesque evidently 

 wrote Hicoria. The whole of hi.s article in the Medical Reposi- 

 tory shows faidty proof-reading, or no proof-reading at all, 

 and the word canie out Scoria. Afterward, except in the 

 Louisiana Flora (18 17), Rafinesque wrote it Hicoria, and the 

 proof that he so wrote it originally is to be found in the fol- 

 lowing statements : 



In the "Good Book and Amenities of Nature," pp. 48, 49 

 (1840), he says : " In the continuation of these trees in the 

 ' American Grove,' American novelties are still more numer- 

 ous. . . . The monographs of new and revised sp. are Caly- 

 canthiis, 5 sp. ; Myrica, 12 . . .of Hickory trees or Hicoria, 

 Raf., 1808, 4 subg. and 4 new sp. . ; ." 



In his " Alsographia Americana" he says: " Hicoria, 'Rai., 

 1808. Carya, Nuttall, 1818, etc. As early as 1804 I proposed 

 to separate the Hickories from the Walnuts, to which Muhlen- 

 berg objected. I did so in 1808 in my remarks on Michaux's 

 Flora, and again in 1817 in my ' Florula Ludoviciana,' giving 

 the almost Grecian name of Hicoria ; yet 'HuXiaW changed it 

 in 1818 into Carya, which means merely nut. . . ." 



. Dr. Torrey has it Hickoria in his Catalogue of Plants 

 growing within thirty miles of New York (1819), citing it as a 

 synonym of Carya. There is a letter of Ratinesque extant 

 protesting against this, and especially against the k. The 

 word has also been spelled with a k by Le Conte and others, 

 but there appears to be no authority for it. 



It is, therefore, apparent that there is no valid choice be- 

 tween Hicoria and Hicoriiis j the only issue that can be raised 

 is between Hicoria, a strictly applicable Latinized aboriginal 

 name, and its misprint. Scoria, which, from what I have 

 shown, can hardly be seriously taken up by any botanist. 



Columbia College. N. L. BrittOU. 



[Dr. Britten's point as to the date (1805) of the establish- 

 ment of the Rafinesquian genus would seem to be well 

 taken, as there is no doubt what the species were that 

 Rafinesque meant to include in it, and, consequently, no 

 ambiguity in regard to the limits of his proposed genus can 

 exist. His view is enforced by a canon (XLIL) of the 

 code of nomenclature of the American Ornithologists' 

 Union, which affirms that "The basis of a generic or sub- 

 generic name is either (i) a designated recognizably de- 

 scribed species, or (2) a designated recognizable plate or 

 figure, or (3) a published diagnosis," to which is added 

 as remarks : " Some writers insist that a generic or subgen- 

 eric name, in order to be tenable, must be accompanied by 

 a diagnosis. However proper such a requisition may seem 

 theoretically, the principle is thoroughly impracticable, and 

 if enforced would lead to hopeless confusion. The custom of 

 naturalists has been quite otherwise, and the mere mention 

 of a type has been found to be often a better index to an 

 author's meaning than is frequently a diagnosis or even a 

 long description. Either of the three alternatives given 

 above may alone be accepted as a proper definition. In 

 the case of a diagnosis it must, of course, give some char- 

 acter or characters by which the organism it is intended 

 to designate may be unmistakably reco_gnized." 



The question is, therefore, properly between Scoria, as 

 printed, and Hicoria. The evidence points to a misprint 

 certainly ; and as a misprint it may, according to the rigid 

 rules in nomenclature, be corrected. ("A generic name 

 should subsist just as it was made, although a purely typo- 

 graphical error maybe corrected." A. DeCandoUe.) — Ed.] 



The Destruction of Evergreens for Christmas 

 Decorations. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest: 



Sir. — That the recent Forestry Congress in Philadelphia, 

 which evidently had the preservation and_ prosperity of our 

 forests honestly at heart, made no protest against the whole- 

 sale destruction of shapely young evergreens every year as 

 Christmas-trees, strikes an interested onlooker as, at least, 

 demanding comment. If this German fashion of sacrificing 

 a tree at the Christmas-tide were a harmless fad, like the send- 

 ing of holiday cards, or one likely to wear itself out before 

 much positive hurt is done, it might pass unrebuked. But it 

 is a growing custom, and has already reached such propor- 

 tions that the yearly December slaughter of the " innocents " 



unquestionably amounts to 1,000,000 or over east of the Missis- 

 sippi River. That such an enormous devastation cannot long 

 continue without impoverishing the forest supply of the future 

 must be apparent to every one. No true lover of trees or 

 intelligent patriot can behold the slain evergreen beauties 

 stacked in the market-place at Christmas-time and consider 

 their ultimate fate without a pang of regret, and even of 

 anger, at the thoughtless sentiment that is gratified through 

 such wicked waste, to say nothing of the ruthless extermina- 

 tion of various evergreen growths, which, if left undisturbed, 

 make our woods forever beautiful, but, when woven into 

 wreaths, soon perish, and then feed the fire or the garbage 

 gulch. 



No one is necessarily any the happier for the Christmas-tree, 

 and the children who have been reared to regard the sacrifice 

 of a lovely young tree for a few hours' entertainment as wicked 

 and cruel, are as happy — if not happier — than the youngsters 

 who, through custom, think Christmas a poor thing without 

 a tree. 



It is a possible thing in many families to use Orange and 

 Oleander trees, which are grown in tubs, for Christmas deco- 

 rating. It is also possible in many localities for young ever- 

 greens to be lifted, especially from nurseries, out of the 

 ground, and the roots so cared for that the tree may be used 

 for planting after the Christmas use is over, to live and grow 

 into a perennial joy, more beautiful when decorated by nature 

 with frost and gleam than a poor, murdered tree ever was, 

 hung with strings and tinsel. 



Seriously, is it not high time for all good people to frown 

 upon a Christmas-custom that is neither Christian nor common 

 sense, and which is at once so unnecessary and so harmful ? 



Bryn Mawr,Pa. Mary Wager-Fisher. 



[The trees which are used in the eastern states at Christ- 

 mas are usually the Black Spruce and the Balsam Fir. The 

 Hemlock, the Arbor-vitae and the White Pine are used less 

 commonly. These trees, where they spring up naturally, 

 grow so close together that they are subjected, almost from 

 the beginning of their existence, to a fierce and continuous 

 struggle for life, in which hundreds perish where a single 

 individual reaches maturity. The young trees in these 

 forests would grow more quickly and with less expenditure 

 of vital force if man would come in and help nature to de- 

 stroy the weak for the benefit of the strong. This is what 

 thinning means in forest-management. The coniferous 

 forests of the United States can supply Christmas-trees for 

 the whole world ten times over every year and be improved 

 by the operation, provided they are cut with this purpose 

 in view. The danger in this, as in every operation in the 

 American forests, is, that the future is sacrificed for the 

 present, and when young trees are cut for the Christmas- 

 markets they are cut without any reference to the effect 

 their removal will have on the future growth of the forest. 

 This business is only a little rivulet added to the great 

 stream which for two centuries has been slowly draining 

 the American forests, and which is going to exterminate 

 them unless some change takes place in the attitude of. the 

 American people toward forest-property. Nature does not 

 recognize the infallibility of republics ; nor can Americans, 

 any more than less fortunate people, tamper with the work- 

 ings of her immutable laws without incurring the penalties 

 which follow their violation. — Ed.] 



Wanted, a Chart of Standard Colors. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — Permit me to call attention to an urgent need, which I 

 believe is felt almost universally by naturalists — a complete 

 nomenclatui^e of colors for field use. It is not strange, with- 

 out a standard authority upon the subject, that the colors of 

 flowers are so rarely given with anything approaching uni- 

 formity or correctness. There are many puzzling shades and 

 tints in nature which even artists who have made a special 

 study of colors cannot name or correctly reproduce at first 

 trial. It is even more difficult in animal life to correctly 

 describe color, and this is found especially true when attempt- 

 ing to define the life colors of certain marine forms of the 

 lower vertebrates and invertebrates. Mr. Robert Ridgeway, of 

 the United States National Museum, has attempted to supply 

 this want among ornithologists in an expensive volume 

 encumbered by a dictionary of ornithological terms and other 



