THE ORCHID REVIEW. 5 
DIES ORCHIDIAN-. 
My remarks at page 365 on the Cypripedium question have elicited several 
replies from interested correspondents, who, it is not surprising to find, 
take totally different views as to the expediency of adopting the new 
classification. Two or three suggest that the old names should be 
retained for garden purposes, whether right or wrong, while others advise 
that the new names should be uniformly adopted, and then they would soon 
become as familiar as the old ones. The recent remarks of Sir Joseph 
Hooker are interesting in this connectionn. In the December number of 
the Botanical Magazine is figured Paphiopedilum Mastersianum (t. 7629), 
where the author remarks ;—‘‘ My reasons for adopting Pfitzer’s generic 
name are given under t. 7573. I think they are botanically unassailable, 
nevertheless I do not object to the substitution of Cypripedium for it in 
common parlance.’’ One communication, however, deserves more than a 
mere passing mention. 
“Dear Argus,” it runs, ‘I have read your remarks about Cypripedium 
with interest, and that quotation from Reichenbach is very funny, but it 
does not quite exhaust the question. In the recent discussion it seems to 
have been taken for granted that Linnzus intended to write ‘ Venus’s- 
foot Orchids,’ but in his Philosophia Botanica he explains that he intended 
‘Venus’s-slipper Orchids,’ as he distinctly uses the word ‘edion’ and 
‘calceus,’ and the meaning of the latter, at all events, admits of no doubt. 
‘Pedilon,’ however, not ‘pedion,’ is the correct equivalent, and you 
yourself admit that ‘the rule of keeping names as they were originally 
given is a good one for general purposes, if not ‘carried too far, as it easily 
may be. For example, it should not prevent the correction of an obvious 
blunder.’ Just so, and as Linnzus clearly intended to compare the lip of 
this plant with the slipper of Venus—a pretty fancy—no serious objection 
should be taken to the correction of the name into Cypripedilum, which 
has a definite and unmistakable meaning. Your further remark that ‘it is 
repugnant to common sense to have two methods of spelling’ I fully 
endorse, but the proper course seems to be to write Cypripedilum, 
Selenipedilum, Phragmipedilum and Paphiopedilum; not to contract the 
latter into Paphiopedium, in order to make it agree with the others, which 
are actually incorrect. The difference between the correct and incorrect 
word is very slight, especially if pronounced correctly. The popular 
pronunciation of ‘pedium’ with a long e (like peedium) is incorrect, 
because « in Greek is always short, and ped-i-lum (or ped-il-um) sounds 
better than ped-i-um (both e and i being sounded short). The other 
suggestion of writing Cypripodium, &c., was surely not made seriously, and 
is not correct. I think trom your remarks at page 37 of the last volume, 
