140 GENERAL REVIEW OF THE ORCHIDE.E. 



obtained from flowers fertilised with their own or with the pollen , 

 of other flowers of the same species.* Dr. Moore especially dwelt , 

 on the difficulty in preserving- the young seedlings alive during the i 

 first year of their existence. 



A little later, Roberc Gallier, Gardener to Mr. Tildesley at West 

 Bromwich in Staffordshire, communicated to the Gardeners' Chronicle 

 an account of his attempt to raise orchids from seed, t In this 

 communication he states that he crossed Dendrohium nobile with D. 

 chrysanthum which produced a pod of seeds ; he sowed these in three 

 ways (on three different substrata), but only obtained five plants, and ■ 

 these he succeeded in keeping alive only for a few weeks. This is i 

 the earliest recorded instance we find of hybridisation among orchids 

 being effected by a bond fide gardener; the evidence is, however, ; 

 entirely his own and moreover the cross was an isolated one with 

 very imperfect results, nor does it seem to have been followed by l 

 any further trial or experiment by the same operator. 



At that period (1850 — 60) there was a prevalent notion among 

 horticulturists that muling o,mong orchids was an impossibility. 

 To Dean Herbert and Dr. Moore, who were well acquainted with 

 the structure of orchid flowei's, their fertilisation by hand presented ' 

 no difficulty; to horticulturists and gardeners it was quite different. 

 Not only had they, in common with many others, not the slightest i 

 suspicion of the fertilisation of orchids by insect agency, but, more- \ 

 over, very few of them possessed even an elementary knowledge of 

 botany. They could, it is true, distinguish accurately the stamens 

 and pistils of many flowers familiar to them, and they were aware 

 of the functions of those organs, but the confluence of those organs ' 

 into the solid column of an orchid flower was to them a profound j 

 mystery. It was unfortunate too that Dean Herbert^s injunction to 

 keep accurate notes of what was attempted was not followed in ! 

 the early days of orchid hybridisation, whence the uncertainty that I 

 still hangs over the parentage of some of the earlier acquisitions. ] 



GalHer's futile attempt detracts nothing from the credit due to 

 Dominy as the first successful hybridiser of orchids who took up the j 



* Gard. Chron. 1849, p. 661. ; 



+ Dr. Lindley in Gard. Chron. 1858, p. 4, states that Prescottia 2'>lc(,ntaginea, a terrestrial ] 

 orchid related to our native Spiranthes and Neottias, was raised abundantly from seed in I 

 1822 in the garden of the Horticultural Society at Chiswick. 



