March 27, 1895.] 



Garden and Forest. 



123 



shelter-belt, not only for the excellent fruit which he is 



likely to get if he plants selected seed, but because the 



Plum, being- a low bushy grower, brings the branches of 



his plantation down to the surface of the ground, and is, 



therefore, effective in keeping out winter winds. The 



Nebraska Choke Cherry, Prunus Besseyii, and even the 



Sand Cherry, can be grown in the same way, and the Sand 



Cherry, besides bringing the fine branches close to the soil, 



affords an abundant supply of food for birds. The tree is 



hardier than the Russian Mulberry, and it can, therefore, 



supplant that variety in the north. . t- r 



Wasiiington, D. c. Uiarks A. Keffcr. 



Foreign Correspondence. 

 London Letter. 



Dendrobium Johnson.e. — Messrs. F. Sander & Co. adver- 

 tise this week an auction sale of " nearly a thousand plants, 

 in superb condition," of this large-flowered species, which 

 has been known since 1S82, when it was introduced by 

 Messrs. J. Veitch & Sons, for whom it was named Dendro- 

 bium Macfarlanei by Professor Reichenbach. Four years 

 later (1886) the professor described it as having "flowers 

 quite excellent ; they surpass those of D. Phalaenopsis, and 

 are as large as those of D. formosum.'' In 1891 Mr. Rolfe, 

 on receiving "a fine raceme of this splendid species for 

 determination from Admiral Fairfax, who collected the 

 plant in New Guinea," renamed it D. niveum, as the name 

 D. Macfarlanei had been given. to another very different 

 plant from that named for Veitch by Reichenbach. But 

 even this second name was not allowed to go unchal- 

 lenged, Sir F. von Mueller, the well-known Melbourne 

 botanist, pointing out, in The Gardeners' Chronicle, in May, 

 1 89 1, that the correct name for the- plant introduced by 

 Veitch was D. Johnsonte, and that he had described it in 

 May, 1882, in the Southern Science Record, and that it had 

 been discovered in New Guinea by the missionary, the 

 Rev. James Chalmers, whose particular wish it was that 

 his magnificent Orchid should bear the name of a Miss 

 Johnson, of Sydney, who has interested herself in the New 

 Guinea mission. 



Reichenbach wrote in 1886 that "this Dendrobe, in its 

 chaste and glowing beaut)^ may one day be an object of 

 the most ardent interest to those who cultivate Dendro- 

 biums." 



According to Messrs. Sander & Co.'s description, this 

 Dendrobium is a free grower with pseudo-bulbs and habit 

 resembling those of D. densiflorum. As many as thirty 

 spikes have been borne by a single imported plant ; there 

 are fifteen or more flowers on each spike, each flower be- 

 ing four to five inches in diameter, snow-white, suggesting 

 a white Laglia anceps. The mid-lobe of the lip is variable 

 in color, usually blue, sometimes orange. It is figured in 

 Rcichenbachia, t. 61, where the flowers are described as 

 "pure white, with the exception of some slight purple 

 stains on the side lobes of the lip." Mr. Rolfe informs me 

 that he has seen flowers which were totally white. Messrs. 

 Sander & Co. say D. Johnsonae should be grown with its 

 north Australian congeners (D. Phakenopsis, D. bigibbum, 

 etc.), and that when making new pseudo-bulbs a high tem- 

 perature is necessary. There are from three to eight 

 flowers on the spikes represented in the figure in Rcichen- 

 bachia. 



Dendrobium speciosissi.mum. — This is a nev\' species which 

 Messrs. H. Low & Co., Clapton, have introduced, and now 

 advertise for auction sale as a fine Dendrobium discovered 

 by Sir Hugh Low on Mount Kina Balu, in Borneo, in 1867. 

 He sent dried specimens of it to Kew in 1867, but they 

 were too imperfect to be named with certainty. He de- 

 scribes it as being similar to D. formosum, but the pseudo- 

 bulbs are much hairier, and the flowers, which are of great 

 size and substance, are white, with a blotch of rich purple- 

 red at the base of the labellum. The flowers are borne in 

 clusters of about four on the ends of the short pseudo- 

 bulbs. Sir Hugh Low says he found it growing on a Mag- 



nolia. D. Lovvii, to which this new species is evidently 

 allied, was found in the same country by Sir Hugh Low. 

 In that species, however, the flowers are liuff-yellow, with 

 an orange-red blotch on the labellum. All the Dendrobes 

 of this section, Formosse, are large and handsome in flower, 

 and have hairy pseudo-bulbs. 



New Catasetu.ms. — The two last issued parts of Lindenia 

 (January and February, 1895) are devoted to eight pictures 

 of Monsieur Linden's new Catasetums, some of which he 

 exhibited in a collection at a meeting of the Royal Horti- 

 cultural Society, and which were then voted one of the 

 most interesting and attractive exhibits seen in London in 

 recent years. Rlonsieur Linden says he has twenty dis- 

 tinct species or varieties or natural hybrids, whichever one 

 prefers to call them. Some only differ from C. Bunge- 

 rolhii, as figured in the Bolanical Magazine, in color, but 

 others are quite different in form from that species, and are 

 more like C. macrocarpum. Both these last-named species 

 are found growing together in a wild state, and the inference 

 is that they have been naturally hybridized, these beautiful 

 and wonderful plants in the possession of Monsieur Linden 

 being the result. I do not remember anything more re- 

 markable in the whole history of Orchid collecting than 

 the discover)' of this collection of Catasetums by Monsieur 

 Linden's collector. The conditions under which they were 

 found have yet to be made known. Nor is there a parallel 

 among the many hybrid Orchids raised artificially, true 

 hybrids, as a rule, showing comparatively little variation. 

 Catasetums have not yet been artificially hybridized ; pos- 

 sibly they refused to ripen seeds under cultivation, still the 

 experiment might be made with C. Bungerothii and C. 

 macrocarpum. 



The genus had not a prominent position among popular 

 Orchids until Catasetum Bungerothii was introduced, and 

 even that fine species was not strong enough to lift Catase- 

 tums into the front rank. But these new ones, figured by 

 Monsieur Linden, and most of which I have seen in flower, 

 are really grand Orchids. I know no tropical Orchid more 

 worthy of a place in the garden than the Catasetums which 

 Monsieur Linden calls C. imperiale, C. splendens, van atro- 

 purpureum, C. Lindeni, C. mirabile, and, in fact, all that I 

 have seen of this set. Their origin will be as interesting 

 to botanists as their large, richly colored, singularly formed 

 flowers will be to cultivators. 



Eur.oPHiELLA ELiZABETHiE. — Two plauts of this handsome 

 Orchid are now flowering at Kew. They were obtained 

 in the autumn of 1893, when they were newly imported 

 from Madagascar, and they have been growing ever since 

 in teak baskets suspended over a hot-water tank in a tropi- 

 cal house ; they are planted in pure sphagnum moss, and 

 they have been liberally watered always. The strongest 

 has made leaves three feet long by one and a half inches 

 broad, four to each growth, and one bears three, the other 

 two spikes. These are horizontal, a foot to eighteen inches 

 in length, straight, dull brown-purple, with ovate-concave 

 bracts. There are sixteen flowers and buds on the strongest 

 spike and these are like the figure in the Bolanical Magazine, 

 t. 73S7, in size, form and color, except that they are not 

 tinged with rose on the inside of the segments. The 

 growths are not as yet nearly as strong as the imported 

 bulbs show they ought to be, and I am doubtful of our 

 being able to keep this Orchid for any length of time. 

 Plants of it are also in flower in the St. Albans nurseries. 



Cattleya Percivaliana is a beautiful and useful Orchid 

 which deserves to be more largely grown than it is. Sev- 

 eral jilants of it here are in flower now, the flowers of 

 medium size, elegant in form, and of the richest shades of 

 maroon-purple and mauve. It was introduced in 1882 from 

 south-west Venezuela, where it is said to "invariably 

 grow on rocks, not on trees, and in full exposure to the 

 sun, generally in the vicinity of river courses, which, in the 

 rainy season, afford abundant moisture to the plant." Under 

 cultivation it thrives when planted in peat and sphagnum, 

 either in a basket or on a raft. The preference for rocks is 

 a peculiarity of another handsome winter-flowering Orchid, 



