CATTLEYA MOSSL&. 
[Pate 246. | 
Native of La Guayra. 
Epiphytal. Stems oblong fusiform, sulcate, a foot or more in height, clothed 
with sheathing scales, monophyllus. Leaves oblong obtuse, keeled beneath, six to 
eight inches long. Scape terminal, three to five flowered, issuing from an oblong 
acute flattened spathe. Flowers very large, five to six inches or more in diameter, 
richly coloured; sepals lanceolate entire, spreading, recurved towards the apex, pale 
or dilute rosy purple; petals elliptic ovate, shortly clawed, the margins entire at 
the base, irregularly crispate towards the apex, of the same colour as the sepals; 
lip broadly obovate, rolled in or incurved at the base where it folds over and 
encloses the column, the exterior surface of this part being of the same colour as 
the sepals and petals, the front expanded portion broadly obovate obtuse emarginate, 
crenulate and crispate at the margin, the ground colour like that of the petals, 
the base near the infolded part or throat stained heavily with deep rich orange 
colour, in front of which it is heavily blotched mottled and veined with deep 
magenta purple, some of which colour is also seen within the throat. Column 
clavate, semiterete, included. 
Catrteya Mossta, Hooker, Botanical Magazine, t. 3669; Gardeners’ Chronicle, 
N.S, xx. 530, fig. 89; Williams, Orchid-Grower’s Manual, 6 ed., 191 
Cattleya tapiaTa Mosstm, Lindley, Botanical Register, 1840, t. 58. 
EPIDENDRUM LABIATUM MosstH, Reichenbach fil., Xenia Orchidacea, ii., 30; Id.,. 
in Walpers’ Annales Botanices Systematice, vi., 314. 
Our present portrait represents a plant which is at once the most popular and : 
one of the oldest and best known of the Cattleyas in cultivation. Cattleya Mossie 
was named after one of our earliest Orchid growers, the late Mrs. Moss, of Otters- 
pool, Aigburth, near Liverpool, the mother of Sir Thomas Moss, who resides at 
the same place, and is a subscriber to this work—a proof, were proof required, 
that he inherits his predecessor’s love for Orchids. 
We had some very grand varieties of this species forty or fifty years ago, and 
they were exhibited in very fine condition at our London shows, that is to say, 
with some fifty blossoms on the individual plant. Since that time the importations 
have been enormous, and the extent of variation that has thus been secured is 
extraordinary, the variation in colour alone being wonderful, extending from pure white 
to beautiful and brilliant shades of magenta and mauve. This gorgeous colouring, 
and this almost endless variety has done much to elevate these grand flowers im 
the estimation of the million, as we stated many years ago would be the case. 
