APRIL 26, 1910 VoL. I, pp. 1-6. 
PROCEEDINGS 
OF THE 
THOREAU MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY. 
MIDDLESEX SCHOOL, 
CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS. 
SPECIES PLANTARUM (1753) AS A STARTING POINT 
FOR LICHENOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE. 
BY R. HEBER HOWE, JR. 
It is a matter of much doubt what the Congress at Brussels in 
May of the present year will do toward the adjustment of Crypto- 
gainic nomenlature, but before this meeting takes place, I should 
like to have considered by lichenologists the following facts and 
statistics. By way of introduction, Dr. W. G. Farlow has lately* 
said: ‘The fact that it (Spec. Plantarum) wag the first work in 
which the binomial nomenclature was methodically applied, is a 
sufficient reason why no work issued prior to 1753 should have 
been adopted as a basis of nomenclature but that fact alone is not a 
sufficient reason for the adoption of the Species Plantarum itself.’’ 
Leaving the consideration of Species Plantarum as tke basic 
work for all cryptogamic nomenclature, let us turn to a considera- 
tion of it as a basis for that of lichenology, and survey its import- 
ant qualitications. 
‘ We observe that in the case of lichens this work covered a 
large area of the world; that the future editions leading to Hoff- 
mann and. others leave ‘‘no gap;’’ and that the original herbarium, 
Wainio, Meddel. Soc. Fauna et Flora. 14:1886 (as well as the 
Dillenian, Crombie, Jour. Linn. Soc. 17:1880) still exists. All 
these facts must be considered in the selection of a favorable basis. 
The eighty species of lichens recognized by Linneus include 
twenty-eight present genera (Tuckerman’s Genera Lich, 1872, 
numbers seventy, his Synopsis, pt. I and II,.1882 numbers 
*A Consideration of the Species Plantarum of Linnzus as a Basis for the 
Starting Point of the Nomenclature of Cryptogams. [Privately Printed.J . 19Io. 
. E 
