— 3 8— 



powder on their fronds, but even this seems not enough 

 and the fronds curl tightly up in dry weather. The little 

 resurrection fern, Polypodium incanum, also grows in 

 such places although it abounds in localities where there 

 is more moisture. It growls both upon trunks and limbs 

 of trees and upon bare rocks, but at the first sign of 

 dry weather, it goes into a comatose condition, wrapping 

 its scale-covered fronds around it, and so waits for 

 rain. 



CONCERNING NOMENCLATURE. 



By S. B. Parish. 



The editor of The Fern Bulletin indulges, in the 

 January number, in condemnation, a trifle over vigorous, 

 of the 53rd article of the code of nomenclature set forth 

 by the recent Vienna Botanical Congress. Certainly it 

 is annoying that this rule makes it necessary to exchange 

 the familiar name of a certain quillwort for a neglected 

 one. Yet it must be remembered that a contrary rule 

 has occasioned some of the most confusing substitutions 

 with which the nomenclature of the spermatophytes has 

 in recent years been afflicted. 



The fact is that systematists long exercised a liberty, 

 sanctioned by custom, of disregarding varietal names 

 when raising plants to specific rank. It was not a com- 

 mendable practice, and the Vienna code recommends its 

 discontinuance. Nevertheless, many names thus given 

 were established and well known. Now there are not 

 a few botanists who have never learned what nature 

 teaches, that exceptions are the most natural things in 

 the world. To them anything but the most rigid and 

 searching application of the law of priority is an unen- 

 durable sacrilege. Yet the logical outcome of this doc- 

 trine is pre-Linnaeanism, and those who make one funda- 

 mental exception to strict priority, by assenting to an 

 initial date, would seem to be estopped from objecting 

 to other exceptions. 



