JUNE] ORCHIDEOUS HOUSES. 45 T 



ORCHIDEOUS HOUSES. 



These beautiful structures are now rendered highly ornamental, 

 and are so general among the wealthy that a gardener is expected to 

 understand their structure and conduct. 



The London Horticultural Society Journal has published the an- 

 nexed drawing and account of the orchideous house of J. Dillwyn 

 Llewelyn, Esq., at Swansea, in Wales, whose description is as 

 follows : 



" I inclose with this the section of the stove, which I promised to 

 send. This will show the shape of the building ; the water for the 

 supply of the cascade is conducted to the top of the house by means 

 of a pipe communicating with a pond at a higher level. This pipe 

 is warmed by passing with a single coil through the boiler, and ter- 

 minates at the top of the rock-work, where it pours a constant supply 

 of water over three projecting irregular steps of rough stone, each of 

 which catches the falling stream, dividing it into many smaller rills, 

 and increasing the quantity of misty spray. At the bottom the 

 whole of the water is received into the pool which occupies the centre 

 of the floor of the stove, where it widens out into an aquarium orna- 

 mented with a little island overgrown like the rock-work with Or- 

 chideee, Ferns, and Lycopods. 



" The disposition of the stones in the rock-work would depend 

 much on the geological strata you have to work with : in my case 

 they lay flat and evenly bedded, and thus the portions of the rock- 

 work are placed in more regular courses than would be necessary in 

 many other formations. In limestone or granite countries, designs 

 much more ornamental than mine might, I think, be easily con- 

 trived. 



" The account of the splendid vegetation which borders the cata- 

 racts of tropical rivers, as described by Schomburgk, gave me the 

 first idea of trying this experiment. I read in the ' Sertum Orchida- 

 ceum' his graphic description of the falls of the Berbice and Esse- 

 quibo, on the occasion of his first discovery of Huntleya violacea. I 

 was delighted with the beautiful picture which his words convey, and 

 thought that it might be better represented than is usual in stoves. 



" With this view I began to work, and added the rock-work which 

 I describe to a house already in use for the cultivation of Orchideous 

 plants. I found no difficulty in rearranging it for its new design, 

 and after a trial now of about two years can say that it has entirely 

 answered the ends I had in view. 



" The moist stones were speedily covered with a thick carpet of 

 seedling Ferns, and the creeping stems of tropical Lycopods, among 

 the fronds of which many species of Orchidese delighted to root 

 themselves. 



" Huntleya violacea was one of the first epiphytes that I planted, 

 and it flowered and throve in its new situation, as I hoped and ex- 

 pected. The East Indian genera, however, of Vanda, Saccolabium, 



