150 
THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
[ Jdly, 
kind. It is well adapted for shady banks, or for the margins of shrubbery borders, 
and is a charming acquisition to the hardy fernery. It belongs to a small genus 
of terrestrial orchids, with foliage very similiar to that of the Anoectochilus , pro¬ 
ducing spikes of small flowers like the Spiranthes , only not spiral. The foliage 
is of a dark green colour finely netted with silver veins, and having a broad white 
vein up the centre. It flowers in July, and produces seed abundantly, and I have 
no doubt that under careful management, it would reproduce itself very freely. 
It is a native of the woods of North America, and I believe it is the only hardy 
species in cultivation, besides the British one, Goodyera repens. —A. I. P. 
THE RHODODENDRON AS A CONSERVATORY PLANT. 
f HAVE often wondered that this glorious tribe of plants is not more generally 
grown, and grown to a larger size—either planted out, or in pots or tubs— 
f for the decoration of conservatories. Camellias are grand flowers ; they are 
universally grown, and very often have an entire house to themselves, but 
we seldom see Rhododendrons cultivated to any extent under glass, and I do 
not remember to have seen a single house devoted to their special culture 
and exhibition in a private establishment. Perhaps the comparatively few 
tender varieties, until recently, may have had something to do with this 
comparative neglect, but this at least can no longer be pleaded as an excuse, 
as Dr. Hooker’s importations, and the success of the hybridists at home, 
have placed at our disposal a magnificent assortment of tender Rhododendrons ; 
while a great many of the hardy varieties are so exceedingly beautiful, and many 
of the scarlet and other hybrids flower so early, that they are deservedly worthy 
of glass shelter. In fact, I have often marvelled that one or more Rhododendron 
houses are not found in every large establishment. Like orchard houses, one 
might be heated and another unheated; the former could then be devoted to B. 
arboreum and its grand hybrids and varieties, and the Bhotan, Sikkim, and Assam 
sorts, and their hybrids; and the latter to all the earliest, tenderest, and best of 
the so-called hardy sorts. I see no reason why cool orchard houses, when the 
trees are grown in pots, should not be made to do double duty by yielding 
a harvest of Rhododendron flowers before the fruit-trees are admitted. Again, 
in heated orchard houses what glorious things a few plants of B. arboreum , 
arboreum album , arboreum roseum , Smithii , Bussellianum , and cinnamomeum , 
would be towering up among or above the fruit-trees in full flower at Christmas. 
To these a selection might be added from the newer kinds, such as B. Dalhousice , 
Edgewortliii , Thomsoni , aureum splendidum , Veitchianum , Princess Alexandra, 
jasminijlorum , fragrantissimum, niveum , formosum , &c. Early in the season 
Rhododendrons would hardly hurt the fruit-trees, and by the time the latter 
were nicely in leaf, all the larger varieties of Rhododendrons might be removed 
out-of-doors. While suggesting the admixture of fruit and flowers in orchard 
houses, I still think the Rhododendron is worthy of the best places in the 
