THE ORCHID REVIEW. — 215 
the entrance to the tent, which contained the handsome Vanda Hookeriana | 
with a raceme of three flowers, V. xX Miss Joaquim, Lelia Digbyana 
and tenebrosa, Epidendrum prismatocarpum and vitellinum, Oncidium 
ampliatum, the charming little Cypripedium Xx Vipani, Lelio-cattleya x 
Schilleriana, Odontoglossum Pescatorei, some sisi Cattleyas, and other 
showy species of the season. 
GERMINATION OF ORCHID SEEDLINGS, 
AN interesting paper, by M. Noél Bernard, “On some difficult cases of 
germination,” appeared in the March number of the Revue Générale de 
Botanique (xii., pp. 108-120), in which a cause is suggested for some of the 
well-known difficulties found in germinating seeds of Orchids. The author 
points out that the presence of endophytic fungi in the roots and rhizomes 
of Orchids is now a well-known fact, Wahrlich, in 1886, having found them 
to be present in no fewer than five hundred exotic species of various groups, 
and that the phenomenon is believed to be general. 
These fungi, which belong to different species of Nectria and Pasariuni, 
are found in the subterranean parts of the plant, not being found in the 
stems, flowers, fruits, or seeds. They live within the tissues of the Orchid, 
at the same time assisting the latter in obtaining its food, and thus it is a 
case of symbiosis, or the two living together for their mutual benefit. The 
author shows that these fungi are present in the very youngest seedlings, 
and considers that their presence stimulates the seed to germinate when 
placed under suitable conditions of heat and moisture. Infection must take 
place very early, as the author found, from direct anatomical observations, 
that they were already present in germinating seedlings of Neottia nidus- 
avis and a hybrid Lzlia, while still enclosed within the untorn integument 
of the seed. 
The seed of an Orchid consists of an undifferentiated ovoid or globular 
pro-embryo, covered with a dead skin, or testa, usually fusiform in shape 
and with reticulated surface. The fungi are thus described :—In a section 
of the youngest plantlet one sees in the infested cells a very distinct knot 
of mycelial filaments. In older specimens the filaments are less and less 
distinguishable, until the knot finishes by being reduced to a great, brown 
mass adherent to the nucleus. This brown matter has often been 
observed, but the endophytic character of the fungus which originated it 
was not recognized. 
M. Bernard alludes to the common horticultural practice of sowing the 
seed upon the compost of a pot in which a living plant of the same species 
is grown, and to an opinion that such a living plant serves to “ purify” 
the soil, as it has been observed that the germination does not 
f 
