22 SARRACENIA PSITTACINA.—PARROT-HEADED PITCHER-PLANT. 
one, becomes merely that of a species, in which case, though it 
might have been derived originally from a common name, it fol- 
lows its “proper” form. Now fscé¢acus is Latin for a parrot, and 
a botanist might make a genus under a name derived from this 
word. In time it might be moved to Sarracenia, when in order 
to carry along its ancient history it would be called Sarracenia 
Puttacina, But it does not appear that this has ever been the 
case with our present plant, and therefore under the rules the 
capital should be avoided. 
Indeed our present species was not known to the earlier 
botanists; S. flava and S. purpurea being the only two that seem 
to be referred to in Clayton’s collection. Michaux, who gave it 
the name of Astttacina, was nearly the first to notice it as being 
particularly distinct from others, though it was supposed to be 
a form of S. rubra, when taken to England by Frazer in 1786. 
The earlier botanists seem to have had much difficulty in distin- 
guishing it from S. 7wéra ; and Croom made a new species of one 
form under the name of S. fzlchella, which is now however 
referred to S. pstttacina. Croom himself was the first to identify 
it. In“ Suilliman’s Journal” for 1834, he says: “Ever since I met 
with the species of Sarracenia of which I gave some account in 
this journal for October last, under the name of S. pzlchella, I 
have felt a suspicion that it is the true original of Michaux’ S. 
psittacina, which later botanists have united with S. radra of 
Walter, but from which this species is very distinct, and forming 
an apparently intermediate species between S. variolarts and S. 
rubra, .. . As I have before remarked, the appendix of this 
species resembles the head of a parrot, and it is the only spe- 
cies in which the resemblance is striking. The leaves too are 
shorter than those of either of those of the other species, and 
therefore particularly deserving the application of the word 
‘brevibus ;’ while those of S. rwdra,so far as my observation has 
extended, are as long as, and even longer than S\ veszolaris. 
The white spots in the leaves, which I have mentioned, may be 
what Michaux meant by the term ‘coloratis,’ while their purple 
