338 



It is pointed out that Vesque, a distinguished worker at the anatomical method, ascribed a definite 

 degree of value to the different characters. 



Emphatic warning is given against any over-rating of anatomical characters, and examples of errors 

 in this respect have already found their way into literature. 



Radlkof er points out that besides comparative morphology, the systematist has the assistance of the 

 following methods — the diagrammatic, the developmental, the teratological, the geographical, the 

 paleeontological, the physiological, the chemical, and the experimental, as well as the anatomical.* 



Macalpine and Remireyt argue that certain transverse Sections, which they present, of the petioles 

 of Eucalypts " may be used as valuable aids in the determination of species," and submit that such sections 

 have importance because the petiole is in organic connection with the vital machinery of the plant. They 

 justly advance a plea for the co-operation of the anatomist and systematist. The paper is a meritorious 

 one, but I hesitate to agree that the method has special classificatory 'value. Losing sight of the mechanical 

 difficulties of obtaining the sections, interpretation of the results is open to the temptation of empiricism, 

 for there are so many minute characters to appraise in each case. 



Sartonf also set out to discover whether real species could be detected by their anatomical 

 characters, and after laborious research he pronounced some Jordanian species good and others not, 

 and some Linnean species shared the same fate. 



J. M. Coulter says the anatomical method seems to result in readjusting specific lines without 

 settling anything, and in reviewing the paper, adds§ — 



" The fundamental weakness in this whole point of view is the idea that there can be any rigid test 

 for that elusive conception known as a ' species ' which will carry it beyond the reach of fallible and hence 

 diverse human judgment. It is of great interest to know that anatomical characters will vary under given 

 conditions, and herein lies the chief value of this investigation ; but even here the conditions are not 

 analysed so as to be convincing. To regard these characters as outweighing all others is to stir afresh the 

 seething mass of taxonomy." 



Here I may add a reference from Irving Bailey, which I have quoted at Part LIV, 

 p. 196. 



" The ' diagnostic criteria ' available in anatomical characters have been 

 assumed to be constant and comparatively invariable. As a matter of fact, some of 

 the supposedly more reliable diagnostic criteria may fluctuate considerably not only in 

 certain families, genera and species, but also in different parts of a single tree." 

 Irving W. Bailey in Joum. Forestry, xv, 176 (February, 1917), quoted under " Timber 

 Sections." 



* The abjve notes have been abstracted from the introduction to Boodle and Fritsch's translation and Solederer's 

 " Systematic Anatomy of the Dicotyledons." 



t " The transverse sections of petioles of Eucalypts as aids in the determination of species." (Trans. Boy. Soc. 

 Vict,, ii, 1-64, with six plates. 



X Alfred Sarton, " Recherches experimentales sur l'anatomie des plantes affines." (Ann. Sci. Nat. Bot.,ix, 2, 1-115, 

 pis. 1-4, 1905.) 



§ Bot. Gaz., 41, 362 (1906). 



