Page:Journal of botany, British and foreign, Volume 34 (1896).djvu/253

 "pseudo-nomenclature.'* 231 in printing Mr. Dyer's remarks was unreasonable, it may be well to state that they have been in type since December, although crowded out by the pressure of other matter. Moreover, we do not think that this is one of the subjects on which Mr. Dyer is entitled to speak ex cathedra. The absence of any definite principle of nomenclature among the Kew school of botanists is notorious, and its justification by them on the score of " convenience" is equally well known. Even in their own publications their inconsistency is manifest. For example, in the Flora of Tropical Africa, the Decandollean rule (Art. 33), "Whatever be the form chosen, every specific name derived from the name of a person should begin with a capital letter" is observed; in the Botsmy oHhe Biologia Centrali-America7ia, Mr. Hemsley follows the zoologists, and abandons capitals for such names altogether ; while in the Kew lists and Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information, the genitive form has a capital, and the adjective a small initial. Such want of consistency, coupled with the disregard for accuracy in dating its publications referred to in our last number (p. 169), seems to us to disqualify the Kew botanists from speaking with authority on matters of nomenclature. But nothing is further from the fact than Mr. Beeby's impli- cation that only one view in nomenclature is allowed to be stated in this Journal. During the last few years, not only Mr. Jackson and the Editor, but Dr. Britton, Prof. Greene, Mr. Druce, Prof. Babiugton, Prof. L. H. Bailey, and Mr. Beeby himself, have had full liberty to state their views ; and if earlier volumes be con- sulted, papers by Alphonse DeCandolle, Asa Gray, Dr. Trimen, the Messrs. Groves and others will be found, testifying not only to the variety of opinions, but to the freedom with which their ex- pression has been permitted. Not only so, but those who are familiar with our pages will note instances in which our own mode of printing names of species has been set aside in order to please individual contributors ; and no later than last year at least one combination which the Editor considered improper was allowed to stand at the request of the botanist responsible for it. Mr. Beeby raises one point regarding Mr. Jackson's Index which demands a word. Mr. Beeby quotes Mr. Druce as saying, -" From the Index "wele&vn that Viola ericetorumSchvsideY. . . is synonymous with F. sylvestris'' ; he then proceeds to cite Mr. Dyer's remark, '* It is a mistake to suppose that [the Index] expresses any opinion as to the validity of the names themselves," and to refer to our own note to the same effect (Journ. Bot. 1894, 376), which, we venture to think, states the case more accurately than Mr. Dyer has done. But surely, unless the well-known sign *' = " is to be taken in a "non-natural" sense, Mr. Druce is right and Mr. Dyer wrong. Here is the statement in question : — "ericetorum Schrad. exLinkEnum. Hort. Berol. i. 240 = sylvestris." If this does not bear out Mr. Druce's interpretation of it, what does it mean ? If it does not, as Mr. Dyer says, " express any opinion," what does it express ? Why is ericetorum italicized, and what does