iv. PREFACE 



scope of the work, and a selection would have been both difficult and 

 unsatisfactory. 



List of Works cited. — Space has been economised by a great 

 abbreviation of the titles of works that are frequently cited, but a detailed 

 list is given at the end of the Introduction. 



4. Raiser or Exhibitor. — The names following the list of references 

 are those of the Raiser or Exhibitor, for the two are sometimes different, 

 and in such cases the actual raiser is often not on record. Where the 

 two are known to be different the name of the actual raiser is given first, 

 within brackets, followed by that of the exhibitor or introducer, as, for 

 example, " Brassocattleya X heatonensis. — (Charlesworth) Hye." 



5. Date. — The date is intended to indicate the period of first flowering, 

 but this is not always known with certainty. The date of the first record 

 is taken unless there is information to the contrary, as in the case of 

 Cattleya X Apollo, which flowered six years before it was recorded. It 

 mav be added here that seedlings which are recorded as unflowered 

 are not included. 



6. Synonymy. — This has proved an unusually difficult subject. A glance 

 at page 97 will show that the well-known hybrid between Cattleya Mossise 

 and Lailia purpurata (Lseliocattleya X Canhamiana) has been recorded 

 under nineteen distinct names, while Paphiopedilum X aureum has nearly 

 forty synonyms. The latter may be an exceptional case, and a good 

 example of the wide diversity of character often shown by secondary 

 hybrids (even out of the same capsule), which seem to defy all attempts to 

 name them satisfactorily, but generally speaking there has been a careless 

 and even reckless multiplication of synonymy. But hybrids with imperfect 

 or contradictory records have proved still more difficult. It was impossible 

 to ascertain whether they should be regarded as distinct or as forms of 

 something else, and many such have had to be omitted because of the 

 sheer impossibility of knowing where to put them. The records or the 

 plants may exist somewhere, and if so we hope that the absence of the 

 names will be detected, and that such information will be forthcoming as 

 will serve to clear up their history. A similar difficulty may have led to 

 some of them being inserted in the wrong place, and if so we hope the 

 errors will be pointed out. The synonyms are arranged as far as possible 

 chronologically, which shows the history of any given hybrid better than an 

 alphabetical arrangement. 



Illustrations. — The text is illustrated with 120 figures of hybrids in 

 half tone, which can well be left to speak for themselves. In two or three 

 cases the parents are also shown. 



7. Additional Notes. — These explain themselves, and it is only 

 necessary to add that they either contain information not included else- 



