June 24, 1891.J 



Garden and Forest. 



293 



claret-red in color. The petals are ovate at the base, pro- 

 tracted into tails from six to seven inches in length, longer 

 than the pedicel itself. They are yellow, striped with purple 

 in color, as also are the sepals, while the lip and column are 

 purplish, with deep red spots. It is a very remarkable spe- 

 cies. — Gardeners' Chronicle, May 16th, p. 612. 



Cirrhopetalum Collettii, Hemsley, is a beautiful species, 

 originally described from dried specimens, but now flowering, 

 for the first time in Europe, in the Kew collection. It is nearly 

 allied to C. ornatissimum, but has larger flowers, and is proba- 

 bly the finest species in the genus. It grows on the Shan Hills, 

 in eastern Burma, at an altitude of 6,000 feet. The flowers are 

 striped with reddish purple on a lighter ground. The upper 

 sepal is adorned with numerous linear appendages on the 

 margin, and the apex of the petals with several slender leaf- 

 like bodies, which flutter in a singular manner with the slight- 

 est breath of wind, and probably serve to attract insects for 

 the fertilization of the flowers. — Gardeners' Chronicle, May 



16th, p. 614. _. . „ ., 



Kew R. A. Rolfe. 



Foreign Correspondence. 



Some New Plants in England. 



Primula Poissoni, Franchet. — This is a beautiful plant, for 

 which we are indebted in the first instance to L'Abbe Delavay, 

 who discovered it along with many other good garden-plants 

 in Yun-nan, and forwarded seeds to the Jardin des Plantes, 

 Paris, to which establishment we are indebted for several of 

 the seedlings which are now in flower at Kew. In stature and 

 general appearance P. Poissoni is similar to the popular P. Ja- 

 ponica, but it differs from that species in the smaller, more 

 fleshy, glaucous, smooth character of its foliage, and in the 

 color and several minor details of its flowers. The plant 

 forms a dense tuft of leaves, each of which is six inches long 

 by from one and a half to two inches wide, and the scape is 

 erect, stout, as in P. Japonica, with the flowers in whorls and 

 opening in succession. Each flower is as large as those of the 

 best forms of P. Japonica, and colored bright rosy mauve, 

 with a conspicuous eye-like ring of yellow around the apex of 

 the tube of the corolla. The segments are obovate and 

 notched, and in the Kew plants every flower has either six or 

 seven segments. A description of this species occurs along 

 with others in the Bulletin de la Societe Botanique de France 

 for 1887, which contains a paper by Franchet on the Primulas 

 of China and Tibet. 



P. imperialis, Jungh.— This is the giant Primrose of the 

 high mountains of Java, which De Vriese described as a new 

 genus under the name of Cankrienia chrysantha, and which 

 Wallace mentions in his delightful book, "The Malay Archi- 

 pelago." 



In 1884 Sir Joseph Hooker referred this plant to the Hima- 

 layan P. prolifera, a smaller, and in every way much inferior, 

 plant from the point of view of the horticulturist. The two 

 may be specifically identical, but there is a great difference 

 between the Himalayan form as represented in the Botanical 

 Magazine, t. 6732, and the Javanese giant as represented by a 

 batch of plants now in bloom in a cold frame at Kew. Picture 

 a plant like P. Japonica in habit, but with leaves fifteen inches 

 long by five inches in width, and a scape as thick as a man's 

 little finger, bearing whorls of deep yellow flowers almost as 

 large as those of P. Japonica. The scapes on the Kew plants 

 are already two feet high, although only the first whorl of 

 flowers has expanded, and there are five or six to come in all. 

 As the largest Primula known, this species, or rather the Java 

 form, has a special interest, but it also possesses beauty in its 

 deep yellow flowers, while looking at it as the probable pro- 

 genitor of a race of garden-plants — for it maybe considered to 

 have all the capabilities of its ally, P. Japonica — it must have 

 a decided value for the breeder and cultivator. It has crossed 

 freely with P. Japonica : at any rate, there are some plump, 

 promising-looking pods of hybrid seeds on some plants at Kew. 



The following plants were among those which obtained cer- 

 tificates at the exhibition held in the Temple Gardens last week : 



Eremurus Himalaicus. — Several flower-spikes of this plant 

 were exhibited from a garden in Ireland, where apparently 

 these stately Indian Asphodels find congenial quarters. Mr. 

 Gumbleton, of Cork, I believe, was the first to flower the 

 above-named species, having raised it from seeds collected in 

 the Punjaub, where it is said to produce flower-spikes eight feet 

 high. Mr. Gumbleton's plants were five feet high. How high 

 those exhibited had been I could not ascertain, but only the 

 flower-bearing portion of the spike was sent, and this was ex- 

 , ceedingly beautiful, being a compact tall pyramid, two feet 



high, of pure white flowers with golden stamens. The culti- 

 vation of these plants requires some care. They prefer a well- 

 drained soil and a sunny position. The crowns, too, should 

 stand a few inches above the level ground. E. robustus is an- 

 other tall and handsome species which is sometimes to be 

 seen in English gardens. 



Cocos Pyn^rti. — This is a seedling variety of C. Weddell- 

 iana which came up among a batch of seedlings of the latter 

 in the nursery of Monsieur' Pynaert Van Gurt, of Ghent, after 

 whom it has been named by Mr. Sander, who obtained a first- 

 class certificate for it from the Royal Horticultural Society. A 

 figure and description of it will be found in Revue de V Horti- 

 culture Beige for April last (p. 91), where it is named C. 

 minima pulchra, a name, by the way, so far accepted as to 

 have obtained the notice and certificate of the Horticultural 

 Society of Ghent. The plant is very elegant, owing to the nar- 

 rowness of the pinnae, which are scarcely half as wide as those 

 of the ordinary C. Weddelliana. The Sanderian specimen is 

 unique, so far as I can learn, and, as the plant cannot be propa- 

 gated, it must necessarily remain so. 



Grammatophyllum Measuresianum. — This was the most 

 interesting Orchid at the exhibition. It was introduced from 

 the Philippines by Mr. Sander about two years ago, and dis- 

 tributed under the above provisional name. A description of 

 it will be found in Garden and Forest (ii., 524). The first 

 plant to bloom was that exhibited by Mr. Sander, and, as a 

 matter of course, it was awarded a first-class certificate. 

 Whether it differs from G. Fenzlianum or not I am not at 

 present able to decide ; but, whatever its correct name may be, 

 it must take rank among the best of tropical garden Orchids. 

 Apparently, it has the same shy flowering character which is 

 the only drawback to the popularity of the other two species 

 in cultivation, namely, G. Ellisii and G. speciosum. The plant 

 certificated was a grand mass, bearing four erect spikes about 

 five feet long, branched and clothed with numerous flowers, 

 each three inches across ; the sepals and petals equal, wavy, 

 half an inch wide, spreading, the tips recurved ; lip small, with 

 the sides overlapping and enfolding the column, the tip of 

 which was revealed by the bending down of the tongue-like 

 middle lobe. The color of the whole flower was greenish 

 yellow spotted with reddish brown, the central lobe of the lip 

 being white lined with crimson, the lateral lobes lined with 

 brown. 



Cattleya Prince of Wales. — This is a new hybrid raised 

 by Mr. Sander from C. Mossice, var. and C. elegans, or some 

 such combination. It is in the way of the last named, but 

 smaller, with waxy-white sepals and petals, the lips also white, 

 with rosy veins and a wavy margin. 



C. Lowryana, from the last-named exhibitor, is supposed to 

 be the result of crossing C. intermedia and C. Forbesii. It re- 

 sembles the former in the size and shape of its flowers, which 

 are white, with a purple or mauve tint on the front lobe of 

 the labellum. 



Masdevallia Mundyana is the handsomest hybrid Masde- 

 vallia hitherto raised. It is the result of crossing M. Veitchii 

 and Mignea aurantiaca, combining the chief characteristics of 

 the two in a peculiarly pleasing manner. The flowers are 

 almost as large as those of M. Veitchii, their color being 

 orange, changing to scarlet toward the lower part of the 

 sepals. It obtained a first-class certificate. - 



Brides Savageanum, as shown in several of the groups, 

 was quite worthy of the first-class certificate awarded it. 

 There are, however, many plants of it in cultivation which 

 are a long way inferior, in the size and color of the flowers, 

 to those shown. Mr. Sander thinks this species has not yet 

 been seen at its best. It has elegant loose racemes of rather 

 small but bright crimson-colored flowers. 



Oncidium loxense. — This distinct and noble species was 

 named by Lindley about forty years ago from a specimen col- 

 lected by Hartweg on the Cordillera, near Loxa, in Peru, where 

 it is said to produce " flower-panicles nine feet long, the flow- 

 ers as in O. falcipetalum." In 1884 Reichenbach notices it in 

 the Gardeners' Chronicle, in consequence of Mr. Sander hav- 

 ing forwarded to him specimens and a drawing, but living 

 flowers of it do not appear to have been seen in England until 

 they were shown on a plant at the Temple last week. This 

 plant has oblong compressed pseudo-bulbs, broad, somewhat 

 rigid, leaves, and a spike five feet long bearing numerous 

 flowers as large as those of 0. macranthum, but differing from 

 all other plants of the Microchila section in the size and form 

 of its labellum, which resembles the lip of the African Lisso- 

 chilus Krebsii in form and color. The sepals and petals are 

 brown, with irregular blotches of yellowish green, and the lip 

 is deep yellow. A batch of plants of this species was sold by 

 auction in London in 1884. 



