SARRACENIA PSITTACINA. 
PARROT-HEADED PITCHER-PLANT. 
NATURAL ORDER, SARRACENIACE/E, 
SARRACENIA PSITTACINA, Michaux.—Leaves short, spreading; tube slender, broadly winged, 
marked with white spots, and reticulated with purple veins; lamina globose, inflated, 
incurved-beaked, almost closing the orifice of the tube; leaves two to four inches long; 
scapes one foot high. (Chapman’s Flora of the Southern United States. See also Wood’s 
Class- Book of Botany.) 
HE careful reader will notice that in Professor Wood’s 
be “Class-Book” (Ed. 1861, before us) the name of this 
plait i is given as S. pszticina, but this is evidently one of those 
typographical errors which even the most careful editor will 
sometimes overlook. Dr. Chapman has it S. Psittacina, begin- 
ning the specific name with a capital; and as_ typographical 
errors are rare in this work, we might conclude that it is no error 
of the press, but that Dr. Chapman intended it to read this way. 
There appears, however, to be no reason why it should be so; 
and we have changed it in the botanical quotation made from his 
work. This may seem a small matter to some, but as our work 
is intended for the novices in botanical studies as well as for 
those who are more accomplished, we take the occasion to 
explain why capitals are sometimes used in the specific name. 
Generic names are always commenced with a capital; specific 
ones only when derived from proper names. Thus Sarracenia 
vubra claims a capital only for the generic name; 7zéra, or red, 
being a common and nota proper name, does not require it. 
There are two capitals in S. Drammondit, the last word meaning 
of or belonging to Mr. Drummond. Sometimes however a 
name which, under some circumstances, may have been a generic 
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