SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 
UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 
WASHINGTON, D. C. 
April 29, 1926. 
Mr. (Jake s Ame s, 
365 Commonwealth Avenue, 
boston, Massachusetts. 
Dear Mr. Ames: 
Today 1 am sending by express the collection 
of Costa Rican orchids of this year. ± hope the box will 
reach you in good condition and promptly. 
With this letter 1 am sending a list of the numbers 
represented, to help you in reporting on the collection. 
There are doubtless some mistakes in this list, since it was 
made hurriedly. Some of the generic names entered, in par¬ 
ticular, are not to be taken too seriously. 
There are included in the box the vials of flowers in 
alcohol that 1 collected, about seventy of them, 1 believe. 
All this material now sent, both dry and alcoholic, is to 
be retained by yourself, of course. A good many specimens 
are unieates, but it is only fair that you should have them. 
You will find in the lot material of all sorts. I al¬ 
ways dislike to pass any orchid for fear that i may miss 
something worth collecting. In esse any of this material 
is too difficult or valueless, as l feel sure some of it is, 
i would suggest that you discard it, and not bother about 
making an identification of it. The plants when fresh 
often look much better than when dry, else some of these l 
should never have collected. 
With some of the plants that i collected in Guanacaste, 
1 had some difficulty with moisture, and a few of them 
have molded. in order to protect the packages of supposedly 
dry plants from the rain, that came rather freely into the 
room I had, 1 placed them in chests, forgetting that moisture 
would be conserved and condensed in the chests. r 'hortly 
before leaving 1 discovered that the packages were damp, and 
had them out in the sun. Fortunately the specimens were not 
injured as much as 1 had feared they might be. 
There are so many of the Costa Rican orchids that i 
have never seen in flower. I should like to go down there 
once in the rainy season, in the middle of our summer. 1 
think it ought to be possible then to get a wholly new lot 
of orchids. 1 have hopes that Valerio will turn up some 
different ones over in Uuanaeaste this slimmer. 1 believe that 
he will do some serious collecting there, but only time wi'll 
tell. 
1 hope you will remember what 1 believe 1 mentioned in 
my earlier letter about naming some of the new species, in 
case there are any. Valerio collected a large proportion of 
the orchids, and some of the best ones. He will esteem 
very highly the honor of having any new species named for him. 
