CYPKIPEDIUM. 73 



ourselves to the insertion of all those of undoubted parentage which we 

 consider most distinct and which we have seen, and to some others that 

 have been authoritatively described in the horticultural press, but which 

 not having yet been seen by us are distinguished by an asterisk, 

 thus (*) ; we have also included a few others of doubtful parentage that 

 are too distinct to be passed over.* With a view of bringing before the 

 reader their chief characteristics more clearly than can be done by verbal 

 description, we have sketched below a scheme of classification or grouping, 

 by which all the closely allied forms are brought together, selecting for 

 the type of each group the first described hybrid of it. The leading 

 principle that has guided us in this grouping — which has no pretentions 

 to a scientific basis — being the strong family likeness that pervades the 

 series of hybrids included in each group, and which has been derived 

 from one of the species used either as ■$ or $ parent throughout- 

 Although the groups are fairly distinct as such, it is evident that other 

 crosses, whether already effected or which will be hereafter effected 

 between members of different groups, must tend to break down the 

 distinctive characters set up between each, so that the grouping as now 

 proposed can at best be only regarded as temporary, but it may never- 

 theless suggest the basis of a rational classification for horticultural use. 

 To diminish in some degree the confusion that has arisen from the 

 application of separate names to hybrids raised from the same cross by 

 different operators, we have reduced all such to varieties of the first 

 applied name. 



PROPOSED CLASSIFICATION OF CYPRIPEDIUM HYBRIDS. 



A. — Eucypkipedium Hybrids. 



(1) Harrisianum Group. 



Gypripedium villosum one parent throughout. Flowers solitary, large, 

 with the inner surface glossy as if varnished ; upper sepal broad, with 

 a pale margin ; petals spathulate, that is, broader towards the apex than 

 towards the base, more or less curved inwards. 



apiculatum Harrisianum 



concinnum Dauthier's 



Charles Canhahi hybridum 



Germinyanum purpurascens 



Godseffianum superbum 



Harrisianum vivicans 



atropurpureum Lathamianum 



Bray's 



* "If we continue to obtain hybrids of uncertain parentage, we may, botanically speaking, 

 sink down to a very deep level." — Reichenbach in Gard. Chron. I. s. 3 (1887), p. 447. 

 ' ' Many hybrid Cypripediums bear rather too close a resemblance to each other. " — Williams' 

 Orch. Alb. V. sub. t. 223. 



