OF me = 7 =) 
a The Orchid Review S 
2. VoL. XXIII. NoveEMBER, 1915. No. 275. S 
ised OUR NOTE yout Eee] 
LARGE number of hybrids more or less directly derived from Cattleya 
Dowiana have appeared at the last few meetings of the R.H.S., and 
it is curious how few of them reproduce the yellow sepals and petals of the 
parent. The combinations with C. Bowringiana and C. labiata are almost 
invariably purple, unless an albino is used, when the hybrid may have white 
sepals and petals, and a richly-coloured lip. This is the case with C. 
Fabia alba, the result of uniting C. Dowiana with a white labiata. In 
either case the yellow is lost. No white form of C. Bowringiana has 
ever appeared, so that the case of getting C. Mantinii with white sepals and 
petals is remote. In some cases the influence of C. Dowiana seems to 
intensify the shade of purple, as if the colour of the lip of the Dowiana 
parent had suffused itself through the other segments of the hybrid, as 
suggested by M. Ch. Maron (see p. 317) in the case of the intense purple C. 
Fabia Vigeriana, which is the darkest form of C. Fabia known to us. This 
brilliant variety received a First-class Certificate from the R.H.S. in 
September, 1908, and a plant that we believe is identical was shown at the 
last R.H.S. meeting from the collection of Walter Cobb, Esq. The purfle is 
so dark as to half obliterate the beautiful yellow veining on the lip. There 
is something exceptional about the plant, and it would be interesting to 
know what particular varieties were used, ‘and if other seedlings were 
equally dark in colour. 
Owing to this particular behaviour of the hybrids of C. Dowiana the 
problem of increasing the number of yellows in the labiata group seemed 
hopeless, for re-crossing with C. Dowiana does not secure a return of the 
yellow colour, a fact which emphasises the exceptional character of the 
brilliant Cattleya King-George (described at page 314) in which the sepals 
and petals are of a clear light nankeen yellow, just the shade that has so 
It is the result of re-crossing C. triumphans 
long been sought in vain. 
and as neither Rex nor 
(Dowiana aurea X Rex) with C. Dowiana aurea, 
321 
