HYBRIDISATION, SEEDS, AND 

 SEEDLINGS 



The history of Orchid hybridisation is a most interesting study, 

 but it is an extremely difficult matter to follow the history in all 

 its details during these later years because of the ever-increasing 

 number of those who make a business or hobby of raising hybrids 

 or cross-breds. Not only in our own land but on the Continent 

 and in America hybridists have been busy. No doubt the dis- 

 covery of the fact that Orchids could be hybridised gave a great 

 impetus to the improvement of plants, flowers, fruits, and 

 vegetables, and led to the conduct of such improvement along 

 well and carefully considered lines. 



About the middle of the last century Dr Harris, of Exeter, 

 became interested in Orchids, and he suggested to Mr J. Dominy, 

 foreman to Messrs J. Veitch & Sons, at Exeter, the possibility of 

 raising Orchids through the medium of artificial cross-fertilisation, 

 and he showed Mr Dominy how the work could be accomplished. 

 Mr Dominy was quick to act upon the advice given, and he made 

 a large number of crosses at Exeter and subsequently at Chelsea. 

 The first hybrid to flower was the result of a cross between 

 Calanthe Masuca and C.furcata, and this was named C. Dominii, 

 after the clever raiser. This was in 1856, three years after 

 Dominy began the work of cross-fertilisation, a work he appears 

 to have commenced with Cattleyas. Cattleya hybrida was the 

 next artificially raised Orchid to appear, and this flowered in 1 859, 



