106 



CORYANTHES. 



From the same source as the foregoing description we derive the 

 following account of the origin of this wonderful plant : — " It was 

 first figured by Sir William Hooker from a specimen in spirits, 

 sent to him from Caracas by Mr. Lockhart. When the plant 

 blossomed in Trinidad, where it is not uncommon in a wild state, 

 the flowers appeared so extraordinary to those who saw them, that 

 the visitors to the Botanic Garden supposed them to be artificial/' 

 It flowered for the first time in England in 1836, in our Chelsea 

 nursery, at that time possessed by our predecessor Mr. Knight; and 

 in the following year at Chatsworth, where Sir Joseph Paxton states 

 ''the flowers were the wonder and surprise of all who were favoured 

 with an opportunity of seeing them.'' 



We have given the popular description by Dr. Lindley of the flower 

 of this remarkable species in preference to a purely technical one, in 

 the belief that such would be more acceptable to many of our readers, 

 and especially to those who are observant of the extraordinary structure 

 as well as of the surprising beauty of many orchid flowers. Complex 

 as the structure of a Coryanthes flower appears on superficial inspection, 

 a closer examination reveals the fact that in its seemingly anomalous 

 and strange form there is all tha essential structure of an ordinary 

 orchid flower ; the bi-lateral symmetry is only in part disguised, and the 

 flower is really as normal as regards its parts as that of a Cattleya or 

 an Odontogiossum. But, it will be asked : What is the design of this 

 unusual structure, and what is its use in the economy of the plant? Such 

 an inquiry as this can only be satisfactorily answered after a patient 

 watching of the flower from its first expansion and its surroundings 

 in its native country till it begins to fade, or at least till the purpose 

 has been accomplished for which the flower was created. Fortunately 

 in this case the desired observation has been made, and we thence 

 gladly extract from the Journal of the Linnean Society the following 

 account of the fertilisation of the flowers of Conjanthes macrantka by 

 Dr. Criiger, formerly Director of the Botanic Garden at Trinidad.* 



" Large humble-bees, noisy and quarrelsome, are attracted at first by 

 the smell of the flower ; but the smell probably only gives notice to 

 the insects ; the substance they really come for is the interior lining 

 of the labellum which they gnaw oft' with great industry. They may 

 be seen in great numbers disputing with each other for a place on the 

 edge of the hypochile. Partly by the contest, partly perhaj^s intoxicated 

 by the matter they are indulging in, they tumble down into the 

 " bucket " (epichile) half-full of tlie fluid secreted by the horn-like 

 organs at the base of the column. They then crawl along the anterior 



* Vu\. Vlll. i,\K 12t», 130 (1865). 



