118 ABOUT ORCHIDS. 
Among the most glorious, rarest, and most 
valuable of Cattleyas is C. Hardyana, doubtless a 
natural hybrid of C. aurea with C. gigas San- 
deriana. Few of us have seen it—two-hundred- 
guinea plants are not common spectacles. It has 
an immense flower, rose-purple; the lip purple- 
magenta, veined with gold. Cattleya Sanderiana 
offers an interesting story. Mr. Mau, one of Mr. 
Sander’s collectors, was despatched to Bogota in 
search of Odontoglossum crispum. While tramp- 
ing through the woods, he came across a very 
large Cattleya at rest, and gathered such pieces as 
fell in his way—attaching so little importance to 
them, however, that he did not name the matter in 
his reports. Four cases Mr. Mau brought home 
with his stock of Odontoglossums, which were 
opened in due course of business. We can quite 
believe that it was one of the stirring moments of 
Mr. Sander’s life. The plants bore many dry 
specimens of last year’s inflorescence, displaying 
such extraordinary size as proved the variety to 
be new; and there is no large Cattleya of in- 
different colouring. To receive a plant of that 
character unannounced, undescribed, is an ex- 
perience without parallel for half a century. Mr. 
Mau was sent back by next mail to secure every 
fragment he could find. Meantime, those in hand 
