387 
A denoclineae of South Africa . 
When he examined the South African sheet of Mercurialis annua in herb. 
Thunberg, Muller wrote up the portion which belongs to Leidesia as 
L. Sprengeliana . This name, however, he altered to L. Sonderiana 
(DC. Prodr., xv. 2, 699), and as a further afterthought changed to L. capensis , 
Miill. arg. (1. c., 793). These earlier tentative names indicate that the term 
‘ capensis ’ was taken up by Muller from Sprengel and from Sender, who in 
turn had taken it up from specimens collected on Table Mountain by 
Ecklon and issued (Un. It. 814) as Ur tic a capensis , Thunb. Sonder in 
1850 (Linnaea, xxiii. 112) assumed that this identification was correct, and 
further, relying upon Thunberg (Flor. Cap., ed. Schult., 155), assumed that, 
if the plant really were U. capensis , Thunb. (Prodr. PI. Cap., 31 of 1794)* 
it must also be U. capensis , Linn, f., of 1781 (Suppl. PL, 417) and of 1784 
(Syst. Veg., ed. 14, 850). Baillon in 1862 (Adansonia, iii. 1 58) realized that 
caution was needed in connexion with this name, and showed that one 
‘ Un. It. ’ specimen, named U . capensis , Thunb., by Lehmann, is Mercurialis 
annua , Linn. But while dealing appropriately with this plant, Baillon 
accepted Sonder’s verdict as regards Ecklon’s n. 814, and in this he was 
followed by Muller in 1866. Baillon quoted Thunberg and copied from 
him the Linnean citation of 1784; Miiller quoted Thunberg and copied 
from him the Linnean citation of 1781. But neither Baillon nor Muller 
examined the specimens in the Urtica covers in the herbaria of Thunberg 
and of Linnaeus. As a consequence, both Baillon and Miiller have failed to 
observe that the Mercurialis capensis of Sprengel and Sonder and Baillon 
(. Leidesia capensis , Miill. arg.) has no more to do with Urtica capensis , 
Thunb., or with U. capensis , Linn. f„ than these two plants have to do with 
each other. 
The specimen which forms the basis of Urtica capensis , Linn. f. (Suppl. 
PI. 417), was presented by Thunberg to Linnaeus, without a name, after the 
appearance of the second Mantissa in 1771. The specimen was written up 
by Linnaeus, in his usual hand, as ‘T. 326 ’ and as ‘ Urtica africana ’ ; it is 
in the Urtica cover in the Linnean herbarium now (Jackson, Ind. Linn. 
Herb. 148). The description was not published until after the death of 
Linnaeus ; when publishing it, the younger Linnaeus, possibly by accident, 
altered his father’s name ‘ africana ’ to capensis. The specimen is a good 
one ; the description is apt ; the plant is the one which has been treated 
by Muller (DC. Prodr., xv. 2, 864) as Acalypha decumbens , a villosa. The 
endorsement £ T. 326 ’ having been written by Linnaeus, not by Thunberg, 
suggests that the number was not bestowed on the specimen by Thunberg. 
In any case, Thunberg was not able to decide what, among the plants he had 
presented to Linnaeus, the species which the younger Linnaeus had described 
as Urtica capensis might be. The duplicate kept by Thunberg himself 
of the specimen now in the Urtica cover of the Linnean herbarium which is 
the type of U capensis , Linn, f., was used by Thunberg as the type of 
