THE RHODODENDRON. 
511 
Mr. Gardner mentions also a very singular 
aquatic plant, called Utri.cularia nelumbifolia, 
which he met with in his excursions in the 
Organ Mountains, in Brazil : — 
" What is most curious," he observes, " it 
is only to be met with growing in the water 
which collects in the bottom of the leaves of a 
large Tillandsia that inhabits abundantly an 
arid rocky part of the mountain at an eleva- 
tion of about 5,000 feet above the level of 
the sea. Its leaves are borne upon petioles, 
upwards of a foot long, are peltate, and up- 
wards of three inches in diameter. The 
flowering scape is about two feet long, and 
bears at its extremity about half-a-dozen large 
purple flowers. Besides the ordinary method 
of seed, it propagates itself by runners, which 
it throws out from the base of the scape. 
These runners are always found directing 
themselves towards the nearest Tillandsia, 
where they insert their point into the water, 
which gives origin to a new plant, which, 
in its turn, sends out another shoot. In this 
manner I have seen not less than six plants 
united to each other," 
In another excursion on the same moun- 
tains, he met with the beautiful little Epi- 
phyllum, Russellianurn, which he thus refers 
to: — 
" The first night was spent by the side of 
a little stream at the foot of the steep ascent, 
a beautiful spot, and one near which I found 
many fine plants. The first that attracted 
my attention was what I then imagined to be 
a fine individual of Epiphyllum truncatum, in 
full flower, hanging from the trunk of a large 
tree that was bent over the stream. As I 
wanted to add a few specimens of it to my 
collection, I soon managed to put myself in 
possession of the whole plant, when, to my 
surprise and delight, I found it to be a new 
species. I have named it E. Russellianurn, 
in honour of his Grace the late Duke of Bed- 
ford ; and living plants which I then sent 
home are now in the gardens of England ; 
but nowhere have I seen it well-grown. It 
will most assuredly never succeed in the dry 
heat in which the mass of the Cactus tribe 
grows so well. In its native country it grows 
in a much cooler region than its congener, E. 
truncatum. During my several journeys to 
and from the upper parts of the range, I always 
found the latter species confined to the dense 
virgin forests below the elevation of 4500 feet ; 
while, from that point to upwards of 6000 feet, 
the former alone was always seen, either attach- 
ing itself to the stems of trees, or to the faces 
of shaded rocks, and (lowering when the ther- 
mometer falls sometimes at daybreak to 
42"." 
This beautiful Epiphyllum is indeed seldom 
met with in a healthy and free-blooming con- 
dition, ar.d this account seems to explain the 
reason — Like many other plants it has been 
too much p'imperfd in a hot atmosphere. 
THE RHODODENDRON. 
The great diversity of hybrid varieties 
which are hardy has almost altered the cha- 
racter of this splendid shrub ; and instead of 
the few species which, until late years, 
limited our colours to the white and dull 
lilac, we have every conceivable shade — from 
white to dark purple and deep crimson ; and 
not long since Mr. Smith, of Norbiton, pro- 
duced all the shades of yellow. This was a 
hybrid between the white ponticum and the 
yellow Azalea, and no subject is so much in- 
debted to the cross fertilization of different 
species. We owe the hardy crimsons to various 
crosses with the magnificent but tender ar- 
boreum, which, applied to our hardy kinds, 
produced the robust varieties which had pre- 
viously nothing to boast in the way of colour. 
The forms of the flower have been improved as 
much as the colour ; and the common ponticum 
and maximum, in their original poverty and 
sameness, are giving place to the most beautiful 
collections of cross-bred varieties, improved 
in foliage, habit, and colour. The most hand- 
some of our originally distinct species was the 
Catarvbiense, the seedlings of which are in- 
clined to sport into several shades. The habit 
and foliage of this species were by far the 
best, and were it not for the great diversity 
preventing it, many of them would have been 
named. This, however, was found to be an 
endless task, and after a few had been dis- 
tinguished, the practice was dropped, except 
where the distinction was remarkable, and 
also scarce. The similarity of hundreds in 
the same way prevented this : and although 
