^'Yes” said Hooker, 'H presume that it is perfect but I prefer cases 
which open/^ The same remark would apply to a good many systems. 
They are perfect until we try to find out what is in them . 
Note. The genus Tremella affords a good illustration of the advantage in 
adopting Fries’ Systema as a basis for the classification of fungi and avoiding 
the futile attempt by searching through the complicated and obscure writings 
which appeared between 1753 and the early part of the 19th century to replace 
names in general use at the present day by names in regard to which it is al- 
most impossible to say what was meant by the authors. Tremella has for 
many years been treated as a genus of fungi and the greater part of the species 
of the genus given in Fries’ Systema are still recognized as valid species while 
those which have since been separated generically are still regarded as closely 
related to Tremella. The attempt to revive the Tremella of Linnaeus has 
resulted only in adding a number of superfluous synonyms to mycological 
literature without affecting the stability of the genus as it has been interpreted 
by mycologists for nearly a hundred years. 
In the discussion following the reading of the present paper at the meeting 
of the Botanical Society of America at Boston, Dec. 29, 1909, one of the 
speakers stated that he was inclined to regard Tremella L. as belonging to 
algae and it was later remarked that it might be well to abandon the name 
Tremella as a genus of fungi. This opinion appeared to be based on the fact 
that T. Nostoc L. is an alga but there is no reason for believing that Linnaeus 
regarded T. Nostoc rather than any other of his seven species as the type of 
the genus. In the case of older writers we have no means of knowing what 
species they regarded as types, and even if we accept the opinion of some bot- 
anists that the first species named should be regarded as the type, a view 
entirely arbitrary and unwarranted it seems to me, Tremella could not be 
placed in algae since the first species named was T. juniperina, a fungus 
belonging to the genus Gymnosporangium. As Tremella has entirely dis- 
appeared from algological literature and is still recognized as the type genus of 
the Tremellinaceae of fungi what possible good could be accomplished by over- 
turning names generally accepted and replacing them by names at the best 
very doubtful. 
Attempts to revive Tremella L. as a genus of fungi have not been fortunate. 
Prof. Arthur as a conscientious advocate of the view that the first named 
'species should be regarded as the type, in his paper on Generic Nomen- 
