3'2G JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Brassacola tubcrculata and Cattleya intermedia. This is partially con- 

 firmed by the unequal pollinia of the hybrid, i.e. four large and four 

 small, in two series. In that case the hybrid should be called Brasso- 

 Cattlcya x Lindleyana (see Oreh. Bev. 1902, p. 83). The sepals and 

 petals of this rare variety are green, spotted with purple rose ; lip rich 

 crimson purple with pure white base. — G. C. H. 



Laelio-Cattleya x Bowrialbida (Oakes Ames in Amer. Gard. xxiii. 

 p. 12; 4/1 1902).— A new hybrid raised by Mr. E. 0. Orpet, of South 

 Lancaster, Mass., between Lcelia albida and Cattleya Boicringiana. 

 Intennediate in structure, inclining generally to L. albida ; flowers lilac- 

 red ; lip darker, with three orange-yellow keels on a creamy ground colour. 



C. C. H. 



Larix Kaempferi. By Alessandro Pirotta (Bull. B. Soc. Tose. Ort. 1, 

 p. 15 ; January 1902). — This plant is remarkable for seeding freely and 

 giving rise to great numbers of young plants all round the parent tree. 

 It is a native of Northern China. Several dozen planted in a shrubbery 

 at Mt. Mottarone, 1,300 metres high, passed through one of the severest 

 winters in good condition. It appears able to adapt itself to any kind of 

 soil, and would probably be found highly useful, in view of the great 

 germinative power of the seeds, for clothing hillsides where man's labour 

 is of but small avail. It is the most ornamental of all Larches, of 

 moderate vigour and pyramidal form ; the leaves are longer and broader 

 than in the common species. The cones are erect, about 7 cm. long and 

 6 cm. broad, w T ith scales diverging like those of an Artichoke head, to 

 which, on a smaller scale, it bears no slight resemblance. The seeds,, 

 along with their wings, are exactly the same size as the scales. It was 

 introduced into Europe in 1856 by Robert Fortune, but was first made 

 known to Europeans by Engelbert Ka?mpfer about 1700. According to 

 Fortune, the tree is often met with in Chinese gardens, usually in a dwarf 

 condition ; and about 1854 he found some specimens in the neighbourhood 

 of a Buddhist monastery, in the western part of the maritime province of 

 Che-Kiang, lying directly south of Shanghai. These specimens possessed 

 stems about 35 to 40 metres high, with a diameter, 60 cm. from the 

 ground, of 1] metre.— W. C. W. 



Leaf Mosses, The Biology Of. By Friedrich Stolz (Flora, vol. xc. 

 1902, pp, 305-315, posthumous, edited by K. Giesenhagen, of Munich). 

 The regretted author died on an Alpine expedition. His completed 

 " Druckreife " MS. has been lost, and the present article is founded on 

 the figures and on notes). — Water passing up the stem of Polytrichum 

 follows the capillary spaces within the sheathing bases, and from these 

 l»;i<ses to the leaf tips by the slits between the vertical lamella), which act 

 like the slit of a pen. Internal conduction is very incomplete and slow. 

 When tlx leaf is dry the margins close in over the lamella-, and the 

 leaf is vertical, closely appressed to the stem ; when wet the margins 

 unfold, the 1 >;ise of the leaf bends away downwards at a sharp angle, 

 and becomes convex above from base to tip, the lamina? being passive 

 dazing the process. Stolz has worked out the mechanism in detail and 



