364 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



reckoned as very considerable — a point on which Syme strongly 

 insisted. 



Mr. F. N. Williams writes to me : — " Whatever is the right- 

 eousness in rejecting the names in Linn. Sp. Plant, ed. 2, the 

 expression in all cases of the master's matured ideas, in favour of 

 those found in ed. 1 (e.g., Adonis cestivalis and autumnalis) ? Why 

 should an author be arbitrarily deprived of the right to issue a 

 second edition of his own work?" With this reasoning I fully 

 agree ; but the collective wisdom of the Vienna Congress has 

 decided otherwise, and I suppose that, for the sake of uniformity, 

 the consequences must be accepted. Nevertheless, where the 

 description of the second edition amplifies or restricts that of the 

 first, thus showing more clearly what particular plant the author 

 had in view, I do not think that it should be ignored. In some 

 cases two, three, or four sheets are pinned together ; the first of 

 these (numbered and named in Linne's handwriting) may be taken 

 as his " type-specimen," the others being frequently different 

 species. 



A.— Carex. 



G. chordorhiza (sic). This represents 5. uliginosa ; but the 

 description and localities given in Spec. Plant, cannot refer to 0. 

 chordorhiza, and rather point to Schcenus compressus L. (Scirpus 

 compressus Pers., 1805; S. Garicis Eetz., 1779). 



6. C. leporina. The type-specimen is G. Lachenalii Schkuhr 

 (C lagopina Wahl.) ; a second sheet being G. ovalis Good., and a 

 third, C. Schreberi Schrank (pracox Schreb., non Jacq.) teste 

 Kiikenthal. Syme (E. B. ed. 3, x. 101) remarks that " Linnaeus 

 appears to have confounded C. lagopina with the very dissimilar 

 C. ovalis, Good., and to have united them under the name of 

 C. leporina, the C. leporina of his ' Flora Lapponica ' being 

 C. lagopina, and that of his ' Flora Suecica ' being C. ovalis. It is 

 therefore better to reject as ambiguous the name leporina, which 

 some authors apply to one and some to the other of these two 

 species." However, Hudson's synonyms and localities show that 

 Linne's contemporaries accepted the name as equivalent to C. ovalis. 



8. G. muricata. Neither the type-specimen nor the descrip- 

 tion tallies with our plant so-called (C. contigiia Hoppe). Smith 

 has pencilled against it, " spicata Huds. Mr. P. and Dr. G." 

 [Goodenough] ; but I believe that he was mistaken. Dr. P. Ascher- 

 son wrote, "C. divulsa var. decipiens Lange=C. Pairaei F. Schultz," 

 It is certainly identical with Paircei, as named for me by Kiiken- 

 thal, but is not a variety of divulsa. If the name G. muricata is 

 retained, it must supersede G. Paimi ; G. Leersii F. Schultz will 

 come under it as a variety. A second specimen, named G. muricata 

 Huds., but crossed through, is G. echinata Murr. (stellulata Good.). 



I think it almost certain that G. spicata Hudson (which its 

 author clearly distinguished from C. muricata L., and described 

 thus : — " Spiculis subrotundis androgynis contiguis, capsulis ovatis 

 acutis " ) really represents our so-called muricata, and should dis- 

 place C. contigiia Hoppe. The citations from Micheli and Pay 

 confirm this view ; against it is the habitat, " in aquosis et ad mar- 



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