THE ORCHID REVIEW. 



why I send you my modest opinio 

 the Latinized names for the prima 

 reference to the parentage. 



n. I thin) 



< we shall be obliged to keep 

 , and to name others without 



L. CAPPE. 



Secretary, Orchid Committee, S. N. H. : 



Twelve flowers are sent, forming a very remarkable series. Two of them 

 would almost pass for erratic forms of P. insigne, and four others for P. X 

 Sallied, as they have the broader villosum petals. But even in these the 

 modified characters can be traced. For example one has a median purple 

 band on the dorsal sepal, and three have the white area considerably 

 enlarged, as in Spicerianum, though in the other three the characters of the 

 latter species are not easily traced. 



In the other six the dorsal sepal is not spotted. One would almost pass 

 for P. X Lathamianum, and two others have a similar general character, 

 with the addition of a little purple suffusion about the centre, on either side 

 of the purple band. A fourth has this purple area more extended without 

 the purple band, and the petals and lip much suffused with brown. And 

 the two last would almost pass for those curious forms of P. insigne in 

 which the spots have disappeared in a light brown suffusion, except for the 

 broader petals. M. Cappe remarks that he sold one last week with the lip 

 and petals lemon yellow and the dorsal sepal pure white, with only a pale 

 purple line down the middle ; and another with a very broad white dorsal 

 sepal bearing numerous purple spots. 



An analysis of the parentage shows them to have been derived from P. 

 insigne, ± P. villosum, |, and P. Spicerianum, f, and it is curious to note 

 that the hybrid between P. insigne and P. X Lathamianum which has been 

 recorded under the name of Garret A. Hobart, has precisely the same 

 proportions. The same must be said of those between P. X nitens, called 

 nitens-Leeanum, Mrs. C. Maynard, and Samuel Gratrix. But there is an 

 earlier hybrid between P. X Sallieri and P. X Leeanum, namely P. X 

 Charlesianum, whose history was given at page 359 of our sixth volume, 

 which dates back to 1894 (when it was exhibited at the Brussels Orchideene) 

 and of which a flower was sent to us in 1899 by Messrs. Cappe (O. R., vii., 

 p. 66). 



The nomenclature question is sufficiently perplexing without this 

 complication, but P. X Charlesianum is a much older name than P. X 

 variabile, and we should apply it to this polymorphic hybrid. The common 

 name indicates their common origin. For any of the forms which it is 

 desirable to distinguish further we should add a varietal name. The pros- 

 pect of ten to twenty distinct names for the same cross, multiplied by the 

 number of crosses which it is possible to raise, is too appalling to think 



