24 THE ORCHID REVIEW. (JAN.-PEB., 1919. 
wrote that the nursery is not destroyed, but a lot of glass is broken, which 
they are busy repairing, taking glass from empty houses to repair the others. 
“Most of the glass," he remarks, ‘was broken on October 18th. 
Fortunately the weather has been, and still is, wonderfully mild, but it will 
take a fortnight to get all the houses done. The Orchids are in a pretty 
fair state. The Odontoglossums, Cypripediums, and Miltonias are best, the 
Cattleya seedlings not quite so good. There are good Odontoglossum and 
‘Cymbidium seedlings, and several houses of Cattleya seedlings. . . We 
have a certain amount of coal and coke, and if the coming winter is not too 
severe I shall manage to pull through till the spring. January and March, 
1917, was the most severe winter I have ever known in Bruges. Jt was a. 
terrible time, and put us toa severe test. . . The Orchids suffered that 
winter, “and did not get any heat in the following summer, so they could not 
- mature their pseudobulbs, and when last winter came, which was also very 
cold, and the coal of the poorest quality, a great number of the Cattleya 
seedlings died.” 
In a letter to the Gardeners’ Chronicle, M. Louis Gentil, Cutator of the 
Brussels Botanic Garden, gives some details of happenings in Belgium 
during the war. He Says that the last month, November, was the most ~ 
terrible of the who!e war for destruction by bombardments. Thousands of 
glass houses were destroyed or rendered useless. On the last day of the © 
German occupation of Ghent, M. Francois Spae’s splendid nursery at Lille 
was destroyed, and the same thing happened to M. F. Pauwels’ at 
Meirelbeke. Nearly all the glass was broken, and the Orchids were buried 
beneath the glass, with the temperature at 6° below zero. Orchid growers, 
he states, have thrown away all but their rare specimens, but M. Lambeau’s 
collection is nearly all saved, and so is that of M. Peeters. The Brussels 
Botanical Garden has suffered greatly—seven houses had to be emptied for 
want of coal, and a lot of rare plants have been lost. The Tribune 
it. The monthly meetings will re-commence as soon 
as possible. Belgian horticulture has lost many prominent members— 
among others MM. Jules Hye de Crom, Edgar Wartel, the Orchid grower 
and one of the promotors of the Ghent Quinquennial Exhibitions. M. 
Joseph de Hemptinne was condemned to death by the Germans, but after- 
wards pardoned and sent to prison in Germany. , 
M. Ch. Maron, Brunoy, France, has come out of the war better than at 
one time seemed possible. There was an anxious time during which he had 
to shut off the heat from half the Orchid houses, and turn some of the 
larger specimens out of their pots. There have been some regrettable losses, 
but the greater part of the good hybrids have been saved. M. Maron’s son 
has fortunately passed through his army duties in good heath. 
