2 54 THE WOODLANDS ORCHIDS 



which diverts so many good folks year by year, came from 

 Lagos, near a thousand miles east and south of Sierra Leone, 

 And the story I have to tell places it at Whydah, between 

 the two. 



A young man named Boville went thither as clerk in the 

 English factory, soon after 1835. We have not to ask 

 what was his line of commerce. I have no information, but 

 it must be feared, though perhaps we do him wrong, that 

 one branch of it at least was the slave trade. Boville had 

 heard of Messrs. Loddiges' success. Residents at Whydah 

 do not commonly explore the bush, but he was young and 

 enterprising. On his first stroll he discovered the^ Bulbo- 

 phyllum, and to his innocence it seemed the promise of a 

 fortune. Real good things must be kept quiet. The 

 treasure was plentiful enough to cause 'a glut' forthwith 

 if many speculators engaged. Luckily he had a Kroo boy 

 in attendance, not a native. To him Boville assumed an air 

 of mystery, said he was going to make fetich, and 'some- 

 thing happen ' to any one who spoke of his proceedings — 

 ' make fetich ' and ' something happen ' are among the first 

 local expressions which a man learns in West Africa. The 

 Kroo boy grinned, because that is his way of acknowledging 

 any communication whatsoever, and snapped his fingers in 

 sign of willing obedience. So Boville gathered a dozen 

 plants, and hoped to have a stock before ' the ship ' arrived. 

 There were no steamers then, and at Whydah, a very unim- 

 portant station for lawful trade, English vessels only called 

 once in three months. Slavers did not ship orchids. 



It was Boville's employment henceforth to collect the 

 Bulbophyllum whenever he' had a ftw hours to spare. He 

 hung his spoils on the lattice work which surrounds a bed- 

 room in those parts, between roof and wall, designed for 

 ventilation — hiding them with clothes and things. It is 

 proper to add that the ' English Fort ' was already deserted. 



