July 1. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
213 
for—very fine and very rare plants like Mr. Veitch’s 
Hexacentras mysorensis and Medinilla magnified, as ex¬ 
hibited last May. Here I know I shall be met with 
such objections as encouraging purse-gardening, but I 
have been too long on the boards to be caught in a trap. 
You encourage purse-gardening already; and at every 
show, for the last ten years, when you give a prize to 
the smallest morsel of a “ rare plant,” you even do a 
great deal worse, for before anybody is at all aware of 
the capabilities of your rarities, you stamp them with 
air importance which future experience often proves to 
have been most mischievous, because you put our teeth 
on edge; and, however light our purses, we cannot with¬ 
stand the temptation of letting a season or two pass 
before we purchase that which, perchance, may disap¬ 
point us tho very first season, llut keep your medals 
until it can be shown at your exhibitions that new 
plants are really capable of being grown into good speci¬ 
mens, and that will save us our three half-sovereigns 
and our vexations to the bargain; and before a new 
plant can be grown to the size required, its possessor 
will be able to propagate a good stock of it, and that 
will enable him both to warrant it, irrespective of your 
awards, and sell it cheaper with more profit to himself. 
The plant at the Chiswick Show, on the 12th of June, 
which attracted most attention among gardeners, was 
an orchid, a new Cattleya, belonging to the same section 
as Crispa, or it might be a Lcelia ; for the difference 
between the Gattleyas and Lcelias being in the number 
of the pollen masses, without examining the column 
where the pollen is found, it is not easy to determine to 
which genus it belongs. 1 shall not attempt to describe 
this beautiful orchid, because Mi. Appleby was there; 
and all the writers in The Cottage Gardener allow 
him to be the best hand at this tribe, because he has 
been a successful grower of them for many years, and 
now has the sole charge of the best collection of them 
on sale anywhere; and thus has a better opportunity 
than any of us of knowing what is best and newest 
among them. 
From this I went to the collections of the Messrs. 
Veitch, whore we all expect tho greatest novelties. 
Here I found the Saxgothea conspicua and Fitzroyea 
patagonica, two of the best and newest hardy evergreens 
of the season, and I am glad to say they are on sale 
already, and not at all dear for such rarities. Sax¬ 
gothea has much of the aspect of a yew, with a more 
upright way of growing; and Fitzroyea looks as if it 
was a cross between some kind of Cypress and one of 
the more rare Junipers. Both seem to be free growers, 
Fitzroyea particularly so, as anybody might see from the 
way the leaders droop, as in the Deodar and Evergreen 
Cypress; always a sure sign of fast growth in Conifers. 
Beside them was a beautiful new white Rhododendron, 
called alba multiflora. Their Pitcher plants were in the 
most luxuriant health, and were very much spoken of. 
There were six of them which were sent to Exeter as 
varieties of Sanguineum, but live of them only appeared 
to me to belong to one species, and they had no disposi¬ 
tion to climb about like the sixth plant, and like the old 
one, Nepenthes distillatoria, but were quite dwarf, and 
so far are better suited for the low stove of the amateur. 
The size and colour of the pitcher are the great points 
of attraction in these curious plants; the colour is from 
greenish brown to real brown and purplish brown, and 
one of them would hold more whisky than it would be 
safe for any Scotchman to drink. 
After them was a beautiful Aerides, called roseum, in 
the way of inaculosum, and another Aerides without a 
secoud name, just after the same style; but I see that 
Aerides inaculosum and affine have sported very much 
into varieties ; and if we could but rear them and many 
others from seeds, we should find that they are as free 
to sport as the Calceolarias. Without waiting for this, 
however, we see them sporting under the influence of 
ordinary cultivation, and I can quote from this very 
collection. A fine large plant of the lovely Dendrobium 
Devonianum had two of the shoots covered all over with 
flowers twice the usual size, but in all other respects, as 
to the exquisite fringes, the lace-like intermixture of the 
soft and charming colours, and the lady-like appearance 
of the whole flower, there was not a shade of difference. 
In two or three years we shall have this on sale as Den¬ 
drobium Devonensissimum, or magnificum, or, perhaps, 
simply Devonensis grandiflorum! Aerides Schroderii and 
Aerides Larpentce are only two of the forms assumed by 
affine or crispum. There was also a small gem, called 
iSaccolabium curvifolium, with a loose spike of deep 
orange blossom, the individual flowers being quite 
small. The best Saccolabium shown this season was 
guttatum, by Mr. Williams, gardener to C. B. Warner, 
Esq., at the Regent’s Park; and one of the best orchids 
there and at Chiswick, was Vanda Batemanii, shown by 
Mr. Lawrence. This plant looks the strongest-grow¬ 
ing of all the Vandas; you could hardly clasp the 
thickest part of the stem in your hand; from the 
body of this stem, and not far from the pot, the 
flower-stem comes out, and darts up as straight as 
an arrow, and at the bottom is as thick as a wag¬ 
goner’s whip handle; then it diminishes all the way 
up, just like a whip four feet long; and all the way up 
it is studded with drooping flowers, so that you see the 
backs of them first, and you might almost suppose the 
drooping was on purpose for you to see the best part of 
the flower first, which is all over of a colour between 
scarlet and purple; inside it is streaked or barred with 
purple markings, on a yellowish ground, and the end of 
the lip is richly tinged like the back; altogether this is 
a noble thing, and any one who has read Mr. Bateman’s 
large work on the Orchids of Central America, will not 
grudge the name. Goelogyne Loivii, named after a re¬ 
spected friend, the Colonial Secretary at Labuan, who 
found it in Borneo, and Angrcecum suavis, were the next 
newest orchids, but neither of them are first-rate. The 
Borneo flower is a dull mixture of buff and brown ; the 
other is green and white. To make up for them, we 
had immense specimens of Aerides odoratum, and large 
plants of such fine things as A. affine, purpurascens, and 
crispum; Cattleya mossice intermedia, of which the best 
variety yet seen was in a beautiful collection sent by 
E. B. Ker, Esq., an enthusiastic admirer of this family, 
who bids fair to rise, step by step, like Mr. Schroder, 
instead of laying out a whole fortune at once to get at 
the top of the ladder of fame by the weight of his purse. 
There is far more to be learned from the “ rise and 
progress” of this class of useful amateurs, than from all 
the elephantine growers put together; because, after 
once knowing their plants, you can see their annual 
progress from year to year, and compare that with your 
own efforts at home. You can also learn more from 
their conversation, because they know the turning 
points, and the ups and downs of every plant they 
grow, almost from the cradle; whereas, some of the 
great growers are as unconscious of the difficulties 
about the earlier stages of their huge specimens as 1 
am of how to rear them from seeds. Dendrobium ere- 
taceum, though not very new, has, hitherto, not been 
much seen in public; he must, therefore, have a special 
introduction. The stems are of medium size, upright, 
and bare of leaves; while in flower, the flowers are 
about the same size and shape as those of pulchellum, 
and of a faintish white colour all over, therefore not 
much to boast of. Mr. Green, tbe great prize-fighter, 
or, rather, the great prize-taker for many years, must 
have heard of my complaints at the absence of Oncidium 
lanceanum from the May shows, for at both the June 
ones he had an enormous plant of it, quite big enough 
to make four plants for ordinary growers, and it was in 
