268 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



cliorius Olitorious.) In Java, it, Eamie,is sometimes called Kip- 

 aroy. In the interior of Sumatra it is called Kloie and Ramie, 

 In the Celebes it is named Gambe. In Banoa l7ian. The quan- 

 tity of fibre in this plant is greater than that of flax, and so fine 

 that of the thread from a common foot spinning wheel cloth is 

 made worth 25 cents a yard. The tenacity of the fibre is such 

 that we have spun a fine thread 175 feet long without winding it 

 up, and a thread of over six miles long contained only 500 gram- 

 mes, in Aveight, of the Eamie. It is fifty per cent stronger than 

 flax. When properly prepared we have it more beautiful than 

 flax in whiteness. 



We have recently noticed the Vandal efforts to use up the 

 mummy cloth of Egypt, for paper making. The Vandals calcu- 

 late that there are twenty millions of metrical quintals of the 

 mummy cloth there, (a metrical quintal is 250 lbs.) We hope 

 that this monstrous profanation will not take place, and that 

 these last remnants of ancient civilization from which our own 

 civilization comes, may resist a vile cupidity — that of some mer- 

 cenary millionaires. It would be a deed of impiety! a robbery 

 of posterity ! The conscience of civilized men would not allow 

 this thing to be done. 



[Re^Tie Horticole Paris, May 1855.] 



ORCHIDIA. 



Translation by H. Meigs. 



For twenty-five to thirty years past, these daughters of the air 

 have had great attention paid to them by the lovers of horticul- 

 ture The English began it, and the continental amateurs quickly 

 followed them. 



Now the family of these orchids surpasses, in amount, those of 

 all the other groups of the vegetable kingdom. To give some 

 idea of this, Mr. Lindley, in 1840, published an account of them. 

 The Epidendi-ums (grow on trees) 71 species. Octontoglossum, 

 5 species; Stanhopea, 5 species. Now, according to Lindley, we 

 have 310 on the trees (Epidendrum) G7 Octontoglossa; 20 Stan- 

 hopea — 397 different kinds of these daughters of the air. 



Many changes have been made (in the 25 or 30 years past) in 

 the modes of culture, and with much success — by giving them re- 

 spectively, the moistui-e, temperature, root and activity suited to 

 each species. 



Mr. Morel has published, lately, in Paris, his descriptive list 

 of about 550 species of them, classed according to merit. This 

 mode of cultured — an octavo volume of 196 pages, with draw- 

 ^-r-s. To be had of Dusacq, No. 21 Jacob street, Paris. 



