356 THE ORCHID REVIEW. [ DECEMBER, 1993- 
walled hacienda, in a state of dilapidation and decay, but a dream for an 
artist, the walls covered with ferns, mosses, lichens, and even a few Orchids. 
Antonio stated that the field foreman or mandodor was in his employ to: 
the extent of collecting Orchids for him during spare hours. This Indian 
informed Antonio that he had been waiting a long time for him to come: 
and fetch the plants he had collected. Leading them around to the rear 
of his hut, in a small stone-walled enclosure they beheld what afterwards 
turned out to be by actual count 580 plants of Chysis bractescens, nearly all in 
glorious bloom. These were merely tacked on to the wall without mossing 
or any medium, and though they had hung there for many weeks, were in 
fine condition, full, plump pseudo-bulbs, all with their leads just starting, as: 
Chysis bractescens commences to grow with the flowering. ‘ Never,” the 
writer remarks, ‘* had I seen such a display before, the lovely white waxy 
blooms in superb condition and in such numbers, exhaling a pronounced 
but delicate odour reminding me—as I fancied—of Gardenias but less heavy; 
some of these plants had monster pseudo-bulbs and carried thirteen flowers. 
to the single shoot flower stem; I have never seen more than five or six 
in cultivation.” 
They then proceeded onwards, and as the trail neared the stream some 
fine old forest monarchs were met with, and here they made their first find-— 
some fine masses of Lycaste aromatica, 30 and 40 bulbs in the clumps, and 
a few fine plants of Stanhopea oculata. 
Arriving at the sources of the Atoyac—a large and deep pool, some ten 
or twelve metres across, surrounded on all sides except the outlet by steep: 
forest-clad hills, the water at the upper edge boiling up in foam—the 
travellers continued gathering the many things that came to hand, and it 
soon became a question of capacity to carry. ‘‘ After continued search,” 
the writer observes, ‘‘ we espied a few clumps of the to-me-much-desired 
yellow Trichopilia,” the only one, Antonio averred, that grew in the 
vicinity. It was not in flower, and very few plants were found, but a few 
more Stanhopeas were added, and a Lycaste which Antonio said differed a 
little from L. aromatica, and was quite inodorous. 
The author thinks that many plants accredited to Central America will 
be found inhabiting ‘‘the Atlantic ‘versant’ of the South Mexican 
Cordilleras; for example, Oncidium Cavendishii and O. ornithorhynchum 
are generally accredited to Guatemala, yet they are fairly common plants 
in our Sierras, and if my recollection is not at fault, the same is said of 
_Sobralia macrantha. Yet not only the type plant, with stems:six or seven 
feet high, is abundant, but the other form growing more than three feet,. 
generally a little less, and besides this the variety alba, all of which I have 
een, and I am told by some Indians who have collected Orchids that there: 
