THE ORCHID REVIEW. 259 
AN ORCHID SALE. 
SEVERAL correspondents have expressed a wish that we should give an 
occasional note of the Orchid Sales and the prices obtained, which they 
think would be useful as a guide to those living away from London. The 
following are notes of one which took place at Messrs. Protheroe and 
Morris’s Rooms, on August roth, when an importation of about seven 
hundred plants of Cattleya Dowiana aurea, and a small batch of Miltonia 
Roezlii, were offered by Messrs W. L. Lewis and Co., of Southgate, batches 
of Lelia tenebrosa, Sophronitis grandiflora, Odontoglossum crispum, Scuti- 
caria Steelii, and other things, by Messrs. F. Horsman and Co., of 
Colchester, together with the usual additions of miscellaneous Orchids 
in flower. 
The sale opened with an offer of twenty-five lots of Miltonia Roezlii, the 
best price obtained being ten shillings for a plant described as a “fine mass.” 
Other similar pieces fetched from five to eight shillings, also lots of two and 
three smaller plants, one of the latter going for four shillings. 
The great attraction was naturally the fine importation of the beautiful 
Cattleya Dowiana aurea, which, unfortunately, is generally supposed to be 
now becoming rare in its native habitat. This of itself would attract 
buyers, but another circumstance tending to increase the competition was 
the possibility of unexpectedly obtaining the rare natural hybrid, Cattleya 
x Hardyana and its varieties, which occasionally turn up in importations 
from the district where C. Dowiana aurea and C. Warscewiczii grow 
together. At all events, several buyers secured a good number of plants, 
and the fact just mentioned may be put down as one of the determining 
causes. The best price obtained was six and a half guineas for an “ extra- 
ordinary fine piece, with seventeen bulbs and ten leaves,” F. Hardy, Esq., 
being the purchaser. One realised five guineas, at which price another fine 
plant was bought in. Four or five others fetched four and a half guineas, 
one £3 58., one three guineas, three or four others £3, while over thirty 
ranged between £2 and £3. The more ordinary sizes, and in a good many 
cases two and three small plants in one lot, fetched various prices down to 
twelve shillings, and over a hundred lots failed to reach this figure, which is 
believed to have been the reserve price. A fine established plant bearing a 
raceme of three flowers, which was exhibited during the sale, was knocked 
down for £4. The prices decidedly declined towards the close of the day, 
but, taken altogether, it was generally considered that the sale was a very 
good one. Many well-known amateurs were among the buyers. 
Lzlia tenebrosa went cheap. About twenty-four lots of four plants each 
were offered, and some seven of these fetched from seven to fifteen shillings 
each, the remainder being grouped twelve plants together and realised from 
fifteen to seventeen shillings per lot. Three lots of twenty pieces were 
