14 



REPORT ON THE 



More splendid specimens of the genus Odontoghssum are to be seen 

 at Trentham than in any other part of the world. Now, 

 ladies and gentlemen, I do not think anybody can walk round 

 the show to-day without thoroughly understanding how we who 

 are fond of Orchids come to be very enthusiastic about them. If 

 you want to find a justification for the hobby, I would say walk 

 once or twice round the show and you will find it. Whether 

 you regard the splendour and richness of colouring, the 

 delicate grace and beauty of the flowers, or the weird and 

 fantastic characters of some of them, I think you will find a 

 justification for, and will understand, the affection which Orchid 

 growers have for their children. Many of the English Orchids 

 are called after insects, and a great many foreign Orchids bear a 

 striking resemblance to small creatures more or less allied to 

 insects. Then in Orchids there is a most extraordinary variety ; 

 I do not suppose that in any family of plants there is anything 

 approaching to the variety that Orchids display. There is 

 another very remarkable circumstance, to which I believe there 

 is some reference in the paper from Professor Eeichenbach which 

 I am going to read to you, and that is that in some cases you 

 get what appear to be in all respects totally different flowers 

 crowing on the same plant. Again, most Orchids are epiphytes, 

 and grow on trees, although there is a singular variety of growth 

 among them. Some few, on the other hand, are in their habit 

 more like plants in herbaceous borders. But I think the most 

 singular circumstances connected with Orchids are the peculiar 

 contrivances, on account of which it is hardly possible that they 

 should become fertilized except by the intervention of insects or 

 the hand of man. Nothing has been more remarkable 

 than the rapid increase in our knowledge of this family. 

 Looking back to the first volumes of the Botanical Magazine, 

 which appeared in 1787, I find that in the first ten volumes, 

 there were only two Orchids illustrated out of 360 plates ; 

 while if you look at the first ten volumes of the third series of 

 the same magazine, which appeared between the years 1845 and 

 1854, you find that there are no less than one hundred different 

 species of Orchids illustrated out of the same number of 

 plates ; and now, so far as possibility goes, it would be possible 

 to fill almost every part of the Botanical Magazine with new 

 species of Orchids if it were desired to do so. Indeed, I may say 

 that I have occasionally, as a subscriber to that periodical, felt a 



