EPIDENDRUM CONOPSEUM. BARTRAM S TREE-ORCHIS. 1 43 



duced tree, known throughout the South as " Pride of India," 

 or " China-Tree," and the transplanting of the Epidendriim to 

 this foreign tree, in a locality where the Magnolia is so common, 

 can have had no other object than to test the question whether 

 or not the plant would do well on any kind of a tree. 



Durine and before Muhlenber2''s time the idea seems to have 

 been prevalent that the Epidendrinn and some of its allies were 

 parasites. Dr. Pfeiffer, in his " Nomenclator Botanicus," says 

 the name Epidcndrum, signifying " upon a tree," was given to 

 this plant by Linnteus in 1737, "quia sit herba parasitica" 

 (because it is a parasitic herb). A true parasite, however, is 

 a plant which is not only supported, or held up by a tree or 

 other plant, but which actually draws some of its nourishment 

 from the organism upon which it grows. But this is not the 

 case with our species. It is, indeed, supported by the tree on 

 which it grows, but only mechanically, as it gets most of its 

 nutrition from the atmosphere. We say purposely " most of its 

 nutrition," for although the Epidendrtims are called "air-plants," 

 it is not strictly accurate to say that they draw wholly upon the 

 atmosphere for their food. If a quantity of these plants be 

 burned, certain mineral salts will be found in the ashes, which 

 are not known to exist in the atmosphere, and of which it is not 

 yet quite clear how the plants become possessed of them. 



Additional evidence that our Epidaidruin couopscmn is not a 

 true parasite is furnished by the manner in which the plant can 

 be kept under cultivation. All that is necessary is to tie it to a 

 block of wood, together with a little moss, and to hang it up in 

 a convenient place, where It can get water occasionally, as any 

 other plants that may be around it are watered. In winter it can 

 be hung up in a green-house, or in a window in any room or 

 place where it will be protected against the frost. The writer of 

 this has found that the plant will thrive lustily under such cir- 

 cumstances. 



According to Prof. Wood the Epidcndrum conopseum grows 

 in damp woods, from South Carolina down to Florida, and 



