1863-1866] ORCHIDS 3- 



let me hive your decision pretty soon. Some Germanisms Letter 663 

 must be corn cted ; whether woodcuts arc necessary I have not 

 been able to pay attention enough to decide. If you refi. 

 plea send it to the Linnean Society 1 as communicated by 

 me. The paper has int< d me extremely, and 1 shall 



have no peace till I have a good boast. The are 



separate in Catasetutn, which is a wonderful relief to me. 

 as I have had two or three letters saying that the male 

 C. tridentatum % seeds. It is prettyele.tr tome that two or 

 three forms are confounded under this name. Observe how 

 curiously nearly perfect the pollen of the female is, according 

 to Criiger, — certainly more perfect than the pollen from the 

 Guyana species described by me. 1 was right in the manner 

 in which the pollen adheres to the hairy back of the humble- 

 bee, 3 and hence the force of the ejection of the pollina. I am 

 still more pleased that I was right about insects gnawing the 

 fleshy labcllum. This is important, as it explains all the 

 astounding projections on the labellum of Oncidiuvi, 

 PhaLoiopsis, etc. 



Excuse all my boasting. It is the best medicine for my 

 stomach. Tell me whether you mean to take up orchids 

 Hooker said you were thinking of doing. Do you know 

 Co-ryanthcs, with its wonderful basket of water ? See what 

 Criiger says about it. It beats everything in orchids. 1 



To J. D. Hooker. 



J Letter 66.| 



Down [Sept. 13th, 1^64]. 



Thanks for your note of the 5th. You think much and 

 greatly too much of me and my doings ; but this is pleasant, 

 for you have represented for many years the whole great 

 public to me. 



I have read with interest Bentham's address on hybridism. 



1 H. Cruger's "A Few Notes on the Fecundation of Orchids, etc. " 

 [Read March, [864.] Linn. Soc.fourn., VIII., 1864-5, P- 1 -~- 



8 See footnote p. 280 on the sexual relation between the three forms 

 known as Catasetutn tridentatum, Monacanth . and Myantkus 



barbatus. For further details see Darwin, Linn. Soc. /ourn., VI., 1 

 p. 151, and Fertilisation of Orchids ', Ed. II.. p. 196. 



3 This view was given in Fertilisation of Orchids, Ed. I., [862, p. 230. 



1 For Coryanthes see Fertilisation of < . Ed. [I., p. 173. 



