598 



THE AMERICAN NATURALIST [Vol. XLII 



fairly meets requirements in the case of the higher verte- 

 brates ; it seems to apply less satisfactorily in the lower 

 animal phyla and in botany. It is admittedly preferable, 

 however, in botany, in a large number of cases, to the 

 binomial method, even where the variation is not geo- 

 graphic, since it denotes close affinity and supposed an- 

 cestry. The suggestion of Clements (I. c, pp. 262-264) 

 that, where new names are required, the third term be 

 chosen with reference to the nature and origin of the 

 variant, seems to offer distinct advantages. 



It seems probable that the " species concept" in 

 botany, as in zoology, can be settled only by conventional 

 agreement ; and the many interests and the diverse fields 

 of research to be considered and harmonized, seem to 

 relegate this desirable event to the remote future. The 

 present diversity of views respecting the desirability and 

 the manner of designating minor forms does not forecast 

 a speedy agreement on even this important phase of the 

 subject. If ever agreement is reached it obviously must 

 come about through concert of action and mutual con- 

 cessions. No radical scheme of censorship should be 

 seriously entertained; any attempt to restrain the exer- 

 cise of individual judgment will be strenuously opposed. 

 Each man's work must stand or fall on its merits, in mat- 

 ters of taxonomy as in other fields of scientific research ; 

 the insistence on Latin diagnoses is a step in the direction 

 of medieval intolerance, and apparently had its origin in 

 personal jealousies rather than in a desire to advance the 

 true interests of science. The ability to write in a dead 

 language is no measure of a man's ability as a taxono- 

 mer, nor of his scientific sanity, nor of his general level- 

 headedness as a naturalist. As said by one of the par- 

 ticipants of the symposium: 



" What constitute sufficient morphological characters [for a species 

 or for a minor form] must be left to the individual judgment." 



The proposition to recognize by name species only and 

 to designate minor forms— the subspecies or "races"— 



