ON SUSPENDING PLANTS IN GREENHOUSES AND STOVES. 
135 
But there are other modes of supporting them which ought to be noticed, 
because they are so exceedingly characteristic. Rude and rustic branches of trees, 
with all the thicker parts of their minor forks remaining on them, may be sus- 
pended over a cistern or elsewhere, and, after being enveloped in sphagnum moss, 
•to give them a verdurous appearance, or partially covered with Lycopodiums, and 
such like plants, to vary their aspect, can have twelve, twenty, or more different 
species of Orchidacese attached to them, as well on the main stem as on all the 
branches. Or forked stumps of a somewhat larger size may be fixed in the 
middle of basins or aquariums, or in any other conveniently moist part of the 
house, and be made to resemble miniature trees, covering them as already 
directed. The extraordinary variety which can be given to objects of this kind is 
within every one's reach, and it merely requires a little taste in their arrangement. 
There is an additional plan for supplying the means of support to epiphytes in 
stoves, which we find in use at one or two places for ferns, and which is highly 
worthy of being followed. It is to clothe the walls that may happen to exist in 
the interior with large rough pieces of bark, or logs of wood, with the bark on, 
sawn from the outside of the rugged trunks of trees ; planting the Orchidacese 
in small cavities left for them on the surface. A blank unsightly wall is thus 
converted into a pleasing and serviceable object. The sole precaution that should 
be observed is, to plant the specimens so that their roots may rather seek the 
outside of the bark than turn inwards towards the wall, for they do not seem to 
like contact with any thing that contains lime. 
A stove, too, would be materially enlivened, when it contains elevated pits, by 
the erection here and there of a pile, pyramid, or cone, of old roots and portions of 
half-decayed trees, on which to plant Orchidacese, &c. Tastefully put together, 
nothing could be more delightful than such masses ; but it would carry us too far 
from our main point to say more concerning them. 
Besides Orchidacese, there are numbers of plants with trailing or climbing habits, 
which, if suspended in the greenhouse or stove, would thrive quite as well as tliey 
do when commonly treated, and form altogether novel features in those erections. To 
speak first of stove species, the several kinds of JEschynanthus are admirably suited 
for the purpose. Fastened on a log of wood, with just their principal roots pro- 
tected by moss, or placed in a wire or rustic wooden basket, filled with sphagnum 
moss, they would be receiving the most suitable management that could be 
bestowed, and their branches, hanging down into the air, and flowering at their 
extremities, would have a singularly ornamental effect. Columnea Sckiediana, 
treated in the same way, only favoured with a little soil in tlie basket, or even 
hung up in a small pot, which its branches would soon surround and conceal, 
would make another attractive specimen. We have no doubt, likewise, that 
Columnea scandens would succeed equally well, and be fully as handsome, in the 
same circumstances. Billhergias^ Dyckias^ and their allies, with a small ball of 
moss tied round their roots, we have lately seen depending from the roof of a stove, 
