1880. 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



365 



■lightly from the Bcorching rays of the sun. 

 They should be grown in no other material than 

 true sphagnum moss. 



This was one of the two or three orchids ob- 

 served by Hernandez, the old Spanish natura- 

 list, a century and a half before orchids became 

 popular, who, on page 266 of his work, gives a 

 rude wood cut of the plant, under the name of 

 the Lynx flower. The name is not inaptly applied, 

 yet to the majority of observera its curiously grin- 

 ning flowers remind one more of a flock of birds 

 with spotted wings outspread, hovering over some 

 object they are endeavoring to take up with 

 their claws. This fancy is more striking in 

 S. oculata, so named from the brown spots in 

 the sides of the grotto, which have the appear- 

 ance of eyes. They vary in size from two to 

 eight inches across, and in numbers, upon a 

 scape, from two to nine. I have had several 

 with eight the past summer, and some species 

 are said to produce many more. Some are 

 without fragrance, but most emit a strong odor 

 each species having its peculiar characteristic in 

 this respect, occasionally unpleasant, but usually 

 delightful — strong vanilla, delicate cinnamon or 

 lemon scented — and in one species, S. virginalis, 

 which is pure white, like orange blossoms. This 

 is very rare. In color, all shades of yellow, 

 orange, lemon, straw color and greenish-white 

 abound, and the pure ivory white and waxy lip 

 of several species gives them a beauty and soft- 

 ness seldom seen in the floral world. A large 

 portion of the species have flowers spotted with 

 chocolate, red, purple of various shades, crimson 

 and rose, and as unlike in the method of their 

 arrangement as possible to imagine. My own 

 experience confirms the testimony of others, 

 that each species is more or less varied by cross 

 fertilization in their native habitats, scarcely two 

 plants of the same species being spotted alike, 

 although the form of the flower, the distinctive 

 characteristic of the species is the same. The 

 only drawback to their general cultivation and 

 usefulness for decorative purposes is the fugi- 

 tive character of their blossoms, lasting usually 

 for three days only ; but this is more than made 

 up by the fact that each strong and healthy 

 plant will give from one to three spikes of from 

 three to eight flowers each summer, and a friend 

 reports seven spikes from one basket. 



Very little reliable information with regard to 

 the several species is to be found in any of the 

 many works on orchids and their culture. 

 Williams names but ten, and many of these are 



much alike ; Bull but ten, the Fairfield orchids 

 but two; and Burbidge does not even include 

 these in his " Cool Orchids and How to Grow 

 Them." Evidently the genus is as they say, 

 much mixed, and the opportunity is still afforded 

 for some enterprising botanist to classify and re- 

 arrange this splendid family of gorgeously 

 colored flowers in some systematic order, and 

 assign to their proper places the twenty-six 

 species now known to exist, and the new ones 

 continually being discovered in South America. 



It may be desirable to add that the name 

 given to this interesting genus was so conferred 

 by Sir Wm. J. Hooker, in compliment to the 

 Right Honorable Philip Henry, Earl Stanhope, 

 about fifty years ngo. President of the Medico- 

 Botanical Society, of London ; the Mexican 

 name given by Hernandez is the euphonious 

 "Coatzonte Coxochitl," and that the distinguish- 

 ing characteristics are the downward direction 

 taken by the flower-scapes and certain botanical 

 difi"erences in the structure of the flower, in- 

 tensely interesting, but not necessary to mention 

 here. 



STRIPED PELARGONIUMS. 



BY JAMES W. DOHERTY, KEWPORT, R. I. 



I see that the lovers of fancy geraniums look 

 for Mr. Cannell's New Life as original. It is 

 nothing new for the gardeners of Newport to 

 see a striped geranium. I have one for the past 

 eight years, of my own raising ; it sends up its 

 large truss of flowers well over the foliage. Some 

 of the petals are half pink and half scarlet; 

 more of them striped. On the same plant there 

 can be seen scarlet, pink and striped blooms at 

 the same time. This geranium I have kept and 

 did not make it public. 



PLUMBAGO CAPENSIS AND JASMINUIM 

 GRANDIFLORUM. 



BY W., VIRGINIA. 



Few attempts at floriculture are more dis- 

 couraging than that of growing plants in the 

 winter in an ordinary sitting-room, hoping for 

 a continuance of flowers the whole season ; for 

 if we except Ageratum Mexicana, Browallia 

 elata, and one or two fuchsias and geraniums 

 which do not appear to suffer from the dry at- 

 mosphere and coal gas, these attempts are 

 generally miserable failures. 



Each year one gets more and more discouraged, 

 and notwithstanding the occasionally encourag- 



