iv. PREFACE 
scope of the work, and a selection would have been both difficult and 
unsatisfactory. 
List oF Works CITED.—Space has been economised by a great 
abbreviation of the titles of works that are frequently cited, but a detailed 
list is given at the end of the Introduction. 
4. RatseER OR ExuispiTor.—The names following the list of references 
are those of the Raiser or Exhibitor, for the two are sometimes different, 
and in such cases the actual raiser is often not on record. Where the 
two are known to be different the name of the actual raiser is given first, 
within brackets, followed by that of the exhibitor or introducer, as, for 
example, ‘‘ Brassocattleya X heatonensis.—(Charlesworth) Hye.” 
5. Date.—The date is intended to indicate the period of first flowering, 
but this is not always known with certainty. The date of the first record 
is taken unless there is information to the contrary, as in the case of 
Cattleya x Apollo, which flowered six years before it was recorded. It 
may be added here that seedlings which are recorded as_ unflowered 
are not included. 
6. SynonyMy.—This has proved an unusually difficult subject. A glance 
at page 97 will show that the well-known hybrid between Cattleya Mossiz 
and Lelia purpurata (Leliocattleya x Canhamiana) has been recorded 
under nineteen distinct names, while Paphiopedilum X aureum has nearly 
forty synonyms. The latter may be an exceptional case, and a good 
example of the wide diversity of character often shown by secondary 
hybrids (even out of the same capsule), which seem to defy all attempts to 
name them satisfactorily, but generally speaking there has been a careless 
and even reckless multiplication of synonymy. But hybrids with imperfect 
or contradictory records have proved still more difficult. It was impossible 
to ascertain whether they should be regarded as distinct or as forms of 
something else, and many such have had to be omitted because of the 
sheer impossibility of knowing where to put them. The records or the 
plants may exist somewhere, and if so we hope that the absence of the 
names will be detected, and that such information will be forthcoming as 
will serve to clear up their history. A similar difficulty may have led to 
some of them being inserted in the wrong place, and if so we hope the 
errors will be pointed out. The synonyms are arranged as far as possible 
chronologically, which shows the history of any given hybrid better than an 
alphabetical arrangement. 
ILLUSTRATIONS.—The text is illustrated with 120 figures of hybrids in 
half tone, which can well be left to speak for themselves. In two or three 
cases the parents are also shown. 
7. ADDITIONAL Notes.—These explain themselves, and it is only 
necessary to add that they either contain information not included else- 
