ORCHIDE*:. 277 



are found in bogs, others in woods, and others again 

 at considerable elevations on the cold and steril 

 mountains. 



The British ones are all bulbous herbaceous plants, 

 with annual stems, and they annually produce one 

 or more bulbs at the root. The roots of all contain 

 a very soft and glutinous matter, which makes a 

 wholesome light gruel, under the name of " salep," 

 and is, in some of the foreign species, made into a 

 kind of vegetable glue. But curious as some of the 

 British ones are, they are nothing compared with 

 those that are natives of the tropical countries. It 

 is difficult to imagine a whimsical figure that shall 

 not have a sort of likeness in one or another of them ; 

 and in the forests there, some of the monkeys and 

 some of the flowers of the orchidea so much resem- 

 ble each other that if it were not for the motion and 

 the chattering, a stranger would hesitate a little be- 

 fore deciding which were the face of the animal and 

 which the flower. 



In their tints of colour they are most brilliant, and 

 the contrasts are perhaps the finest that are to be 

 met with in all the pencilling of nature. Nor are 

 the plants so diminutive, or of so short duration, as 

 they are with us. Many of them are perennial ; and 

 though there are perhaps none of which the roots 

 and stems can be considered as wood, yet they 

 continue to endure and to grow where wood never 

 "grew. It would be impossible, however, in any 

 description that could be written, to convey a popu- 

 lar notion of their forms; but there are some of 

 them that, in point of absolute beauty, and in as far 

 as flowers are concerned that is utility, are entitled 

 to take the lead among the whole of the flower pro- 

 ducing-tribes. 



The following is a Hack outline of part of the 



flower of the one which may perhaps be regarded 



as the foremost of the tribe, and in point of floral 



beauty, the foremost of the whole vegetable king- 



A a 



