114 
THE ORCHID WORLD. 
will be finished ; but 1 will not stop to discuss 
shading now, as I hope to have an opportunity 
befOi'e the warm weather comes, and there is 
a good lot to be said about it. The flooring 
had better be left the natural soil, but a 
sprinkling of fine coke may be spread ove/ it 
to give it a neater appearance, and a 
wooden or other portable pathway may be 
laid down. The inside width of the house 
will be pi ft, and of this 3 ft. should be used 
for pathway, and, roughly, 3 ft. on each side 
for staging. 
This is not meant to be the last word in 
orchid-house construction. When plants are 
large and mature a house with more roof room 
and a bigger volume of air might be more 
suitable. But in this narrow house the plants 
and seed are always under one's eve, within 
easy reach, and the temperature can be got 
up or reduced quickly. Instead of a long 
house divided into hot and cool divisions it 
would be decidedly better to have separate 
houses running into a corridor. Some device 
for keeping cockroaches, woodlice, etc., from 
getting at the plants, such as having the legs 
of the staging standing in metal saucers full 
of water, should also be thought out. But 
the essentials are light and warmth, and my 
house on the open site will give this, and, 
besides, there will be an economy in space 
and work, and the plants will not become 
drawn, as they can never stand far away from 
the glas3. 
Having now secured the best possible 
house on an open site, the next question will 
be stocking it. Assuming that orchids have 
not been previous'.y grown at all, and that any 
previous knowledge of them is scanty or 
entirely wanting, it may be rather a bold 
thing- to recommend an immediate launch into 
hybridising. But first let me divide the 
amateurs into two classes : the one of limited 
resources, who will tend his plants with his 
own hands — with perhaps the assistance now 
and then of labour unskilled in orchids — 
during his leisure hours, and the one who is 
in a position to employ skilled orchid labour. 
The former can never hope to accomplish 
much in the way of raising orchid seedlings, 
as the almost hourl}- attention required would 
be bej ond an\ one who has other business to 
attend to. The veriest beginner, however, 
providing he can find the time, would find a 
recreation of much variety in the cross- 
breeding of orchids, and, while the raising of 
them and the subsequent growing might pre- 
sent many difficulties, still ultimate success 
and progress need never be despaired of, and 
the advice of a practical professional friend 
might be occasionally called in. 
But these notes must, from the nature of 
the subject, more apply to the amateur in a 
position to employ labour and with some 
ambition in the direction of orchid grow-ing. 
The gentleman with a little capital to spare 
and with empty glass-houses of the right 
pattern and on the right site, and with a good 
intention of adding to his other possessions 
a collection of orchids, is in a most happ\' 
position, and much will depend upon the wax- 
he sets to work now whether pleasure and 
profit or disappointment and loss await him 
in the future, and it is with much honesty of 
conviction that I set out to advise him. 
The expansion of orchid culture has made 
\ ery great progress in this country during the 
last twenty years ; but has it made the pro- 
gx-ess that the beauty, lasting qualities, infinite 
variety and inexplicable charm of this great 
and bizarre order of plants deserves? Con- 
sidering the great love of flowers inherent in 
the people of these islands, and the vast 
amount of money spent in the upkeep of 
gardens, why is it that so few of the larger 
estates have a collection of orchids commen- 
surate with the other departments of the 
garden? Time was when places like Chats- 
wo.th, Wentworth and Trentham had collec- 
tions worthy of their great gardening tradi- 
tions, when their owners and gardeners were 
pioneers in the collecting and growing of 
orchids. Why, with but few exceptions, do 
the palatial gardens of the present day lag so 
far behind in the culture of the orchid ? Is 
it because it is too insignificant, and' therefore 
negligible? I think not. I have recently 
read some worthy books who.se avowed 
raison d'etre is the popularisation of the 
orchid, but we seem to be lacking means of 
introducing it to the patrician class, to which, 
