590 PEESONAL AUTHORITIES. 



particularly stupid form of label, where " Ex. herb." is the 

 printed substitute for correct description, has doubtless led to 

 numerous mis-records. Under the very condensed form of this 

 present work, it was impossible to shew the transfer of a speci- 

 men from A to B, and possibly a further transfer of the same 

 from B to C, befoj^e the surname on its label came to be quoted 

 here as the authority for a county. Nor would the labels them- 

 selves by any means always have afforded the data for doing so, 

 even if space had allowed. 



6. Specimens which have passed through the distributing 

 societies, must be still more likely to create and spread errors 

 arising from the displacement of labels. When members send 

 more specimens than labels, or labels so inaccurate as to require 

 re-writing, there is constant chance of mis-copying the names of 

 places carelessly written. Such names are often so written by 

 contributors themselves, as to be found utterly illegible to any- 

 body at a distance, and not specially famUiar with the names of 

 perhaps very insignificant places. It is not uncommon to see 

 the names so penned that only two or three of their letters can 

 be made out clearly. And it has unfortunately chanced that 

 some of the most active distributors on behalf of the Exchange 

 Club, and also of the Botanical Society of London, were botanists 

 whose writing it was difficult to decipher, especially so with 

 respect to local names ; their own labels thus setting bad 

 examples to other contributors. 



Another frequent default is that of omitting the coimty ; and as 

 the same name applies to two or more places in hundreds of 

 instances, a fertile source of error arises through not adding the 

 county in which the locality is situate. Every botanical work, 

 dealing much with localities, has instances of wide misposition 

 through sameness of names in different counties, or even in 

 different parts of the same county. Such mispositions, however, 

 are usually traceable back to remissness in the first reporters of 

 the locaUties, and are thus not fairly attributable to after 

 compilers. Even the names of persons get confused apd inter- 



