Plate 165. 



HYACINTH — " ETNA." 



The season which has just passed was such a notoriously bad one for Hyacinths that at 

 the spring hyacinth shows no novelty worth illustration appeared. At a later date, how- 

 ever, April 7th, Messrs. Veitch and Sons — who every year now take the highest awards — 

 exhibited the subject of our present plate at the Eoyal Horticultural Society, and were 

 awarded a first-class certificate for it the only Hyacinth of the season so certificated. Hyacinth 

 Etna may be described as a fine semi-double variety, with broad smooth and fiat petals, 

 which are crimson in colour, obscurely striped with carmine, and deliciously fragrant with 

 an odour something like lilac. The compost most suitable for growing Hyacinths to 

 perfection is one-half decomposed friable turfy loam, and the remainder equal parts of well- 

 rotted manure, leaf mould, and silver sand, two-thirds of the bulb 'being left above the soil. 

 The season for planting is from September onwards ; and, after planting, the pots should be 

 placed out of doors, well watered, and the bulbs covered with old rotted tan or leaves to the 

 depth of about six inches, in which material they should remain (ill the leaves make a good 

 start. After this the plants should be removed to a cold house, or frame, as a preliminary 

 to introducing them to a warm atmosphere, when they will flower well from December 

 onwards. They do best when placed as near as possible to the glass, with plenty of venti- 

 lation, and rain or soft water should be given. If these conditions are complied with, good 

 short, healthy, stiff leaves and a line bloom will be the result. The double-flowered varieties 

 are generally preferred, but we can see no reason why this should be : the constitution of 

 the single and semi-double forms is more robust, and there is usually a larger number of 

 flowers on the spikes of the single varieties. 



Plate 166. 

 PHAL^NOPSTS LEUCORRHQDA. 



The plant figured was recently drawn at the establishment of Mr. William Bull, of 

 Chelsea, who imported it from the Eastern Archipelago. Mr. Bull, in writing to us of 

 this plant, describes the flower as having the tendrils of the middle partition of the 

 lip very thin and long, and quite like those of P. amabilis ; the callus too like 

 that of P. amabilis, but yellow; and yet the ilower is easily recognised, the petals 

 having a rosy hue, the lines of the lateral partitions of the lip being brownish, not 

 purplish, there being much yellow over the whole lip, and numerous brownish dots on the 

 lateral sepals inside. All the sepals are yellowish-green outside, while the whole shape 

 of the flower is that of P. Schiller i ana. PhaUcnopsis leucorrhoda is a new species, described 

 for the first time by Professor Eeichenbach, in the Gardeners Chronicle for March Gth last; 

 who there says it may possibly be a hybrid between P. Schilleriana and P. amabilis. 

 It would appear that Mr. Low, as well as Mr. Bull, had the plant in flower at the same 

 time ; and the latter wrote to Professor Eeichenbach stating, " that the plant which pro- 

 duced the bloom had leaves like P. Schilleriana, perhaps not quite so much white in the 

 mottling, but still, before ilowering, any one would have bought it for P. Schilleriana." 

 In the Gardeners Chronicle for May 8th last, Professor Eeichenbach, under the name 

 of Phahenopsis casta, describes still another Phalamopsis, alike in the possession of Mr. 

 Bull and Mr. Low; and, singularly to say, the two specimens (one at Chelsea, and the 

 other at Clapton) are the only two known at present to exist. This plant, says the 

 Professor, is probably a natural mule, and quite unrivalled for its chaste beauty, bearing 

 the splendid white of P. amabilis, with a little tint of blushing purple. 



