THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, January 6, 1857. 
233 
Pteris arguta, fine, geranifoiia, Stenozemia aurita, Hemi- 
dictyon marginalis, Platyloma calomelanos, Lycopodium 
delicatissimum, Leucostegia (Davallia ) chcerophylla, Platy- 
c&rium grande, and Drynaria quercifolia. 
Now, these are such as could not fail to catch the eye 
of any one not much versed with Ferns like the re¬ 
viewer. For the last few years the names of Ferns were 
in a transition state, but now we have a standard autho¬ 
rity for them in the new Catalogue of the collector at 
Ivew by Mr. Smith, the curator there, who has devoted 
a lifetime particularly to the study of this elegant tribe 
of plants. I am indebted to the author for an early 
copy of this Catalogue, which is not on sale, but which 
any collector may procure by application to Mr. Smith, 
with a view of exchanging Ferns. Nurserymen ought 
to make themselves masters of this extensive list, and 
square their own lists of Ferns with it in their next 
catalogues. The best, and by far the best nursery cata¬ 
logue of Ferns which has been sent to me is that from 
Mr. Sim, of Foot’s Cray, Kent; it is a priced and de¬ 
scriptive list, full of practical directions about them. I 
am also under obligations to Mr. Smith for valuable 
instructions about the revised sections and genera in 
bis Catalogue, and 1 may almost say that I have begun 
to study Ferns at last. Indeed, I do not see how other¬ 
wise to help myself; they are constantly in my path, and 
one hardly fancies having to be always asking about 
them, and boring other people to spare one’s own brains. 
Moreover, I am still further indebted to Mr. Smith for a 
most favourable introduction to Dr. J. D. Hooker, who 
I think will be Humboldt the Second, and who, I am most 
happy to say, I found as anxious to leai'n about bedding- 
out plants as if he was brought up at Shrublaud Park 
itself. Now we shall have the highest philosophy on our 
side, as well as the highest ladies in the land, Dr. 
Hooker being an associate with Sir W. J. Hooker, his 
father, in the Directorship of the National Gardens at 
Kew. I had the advice of Sir W. J. Hooker to carry j 
on garden experiments when Dr. J. D. Hooker was in 
long clothes ; and, after many a night’s “ entertainment” 
from his able pen, I have at last found access to him¬ 
self, of which 1 shall gladly avail myself whenever I 
get into a fix botanical. 
But to the Ferns in the Exotic. My guide now 
opened a door, and we were full in the open air, i 
over head and ears in Ferns again, rocks and valleys, 
mountain-sides and open plains, full of them in all 
directions; arrangements for temporary shelters for 
them in hard weather; but I left them with a pro¬ 
mise to call some other day, and plunged into 
the depths of the Orchid-houses, taking the Dendro- 
Zdam-house first, a span-roofed house, seventy feet long, 
with a flat stage along the centre, and a side, flat 
stage all round ; also hooks and eyes to hang “Dendro- 
hobbyums” from the roof. The winter heat here is 65°, 
and the whole house was as dry as an ordinary con¬ 
servatory in the country. Indeed, it would surprise 
many of the country gardeners to see how dry Mr. Veitch 
keeps all his Orchids in winter. You could not damp a 
cambric pocket-handkerchief with all the wet which was 
in all his houses of them, in the three principal ones at 
least. That for Cattleyas stands across from the end of 
this, and the Vanda, and Aerides, and such-like plants 
house, which corresponds with this one for Dendrobes 
and their allies. The paths, the shelves, most of the pots, 
blocks, stems, roots, and leaves, did not seem to me to 
have had a drop of water over them for the last ten days, 
and Mr. Yeitch told me that he keeps them equally dry 
the whole winter; but I am quite sure the same degree 
of dryness could not be kept up with impunity in most 
houses that I know, and 1 could see the reason for the 
difference with one eye. Mr. Veitch has been so long 
importing these plants, and getting rid of the young and 
small fry as soon as possible, that his immense collection 
of Orchids may be said to consist entirely of plants fully 
established, and such plants take to grow and go to rest 
just as naturally, at the turn of the seasons, as if they 
were British plants; and, as his plan is successful beyond 
question, it would imply that a private grower should 
keep all his specimen plants in one dry house, and his 
nursing-plants, that is, all the young stock, in a small 
damp house during the winter. 
Mr. Veitch’s CaWeya- house corresponds with the inter¬ 
mediate house or cool bouse of the amateur, only that 
he keeps it 5° warmer. Even in this Dendrobe-liouse 
at least one-third of the plants are usually kept 5° lower 
than they are with him; but read the following names of 
some of the rarest, and others of the most prominent, ob¬ 
jects in this house, and judge between us. All I can 
say is, that I never saw any collection of Orchids so 
uniformly healthy as this is, and I have known all the 
best collections within many miles of London for the 
last quarter of a century. I saw the first Aerides affinis 
in bloom, which opened up that class of flowers in Eng¬ 
land. At that time the garden of the Horticultural 
Society was the best place for them in London. 
Let us take the Dendrobiums first, and begin with 
Farmeri, several of it two feet long; D. albo-sanguineum, 
Dalhousiauum, tortile, chrysotoxum, with bulbs like Laelia 
superbiens; D. aggregatum major, formosum, Devoni- 
anum, onosmum, and macrophyllum major, or giganteum 
(this is the newer kind of the strong Rhubarb-smelling 
one, monilif'orme); Cambridgeanum (Paxton), and ochre- 
atum (Lindley),and Pierardia latifolium, suspended; Tri- 
cbopilium suavis and coccineum, eighteen inches across; 
Oncidium papilio, with twenty-two flower-spikes, and 
two feet across ; Calanthe vestita, many specimens, and 
just pushing out the buds of their flower-stems (1 st Nov.). 
Mr. Jackson and Mr. Wooly had them in bloom that 
day. Oncidium ampliatum major, three feet in diameter; 
O. incurvum in bloom, with upi’ight-branching spikes 
three to four feet long, and lilac and white flowers in 
abundance; O. oblougatum and nngulatum, the latter 
in bloom, with long-branched spikes; Odontoglossum 
nebulosum in bloom, and citrosmum, eighteen inches 
across; Cypripedium villosum, eighteen inches across; 
C. barbatum superbum in seed, the pods not unlike a 
Chili Capsicum ; C. caudatum and Lowi, both very fine; 
Europedium Lindenianum; two fine Chysis bractescens, 
and large specimens of C. aurea; Sophronitis grandiflora 
in flower ; Ansellia Africana, very strong, and some of the 
stems being five feet in length; Angraecum virens and 
suavis, suspended; Cymbidium eburneum, very fine 
and healthy, with Anguloa Miltonia, and a host of 
other such-like genera, and all under the same treatment 
as the whole family of Dendrobiums, and full-grown 
specimens of almost all the kinds, and so arranged, as 
to heights, that every one of them might be judged 
from the paths. 
Cattleya House. —This is a large, wide house, with 
a front stage, and all the back in one sloping stage. 
Some of the specimens here are enormous, and are 
perfect pictures of health and cleanliness. They are 
kept equally dry as in the last house, and 5° cooler, 
that is, 60° for the greatest fire heat; and the kinds 
which are mixed with Cattleyas are such as Ltelia 
Perrinii and its variety Pallida, both in bloom; also a kind 
called Leopoldi. The original Ltelia purpurata is now 
two feet across, a splendid thing. Brassavola Digbyana, 
and others of that stamp, the Cattleyas themselves 
being beyond anything I ever saw when thus grouped 
together. Skinneri is a full yard across; 'crispa superba, 
thirty inches ditto; several Mossite two feet across; 
the largest Aclandise I ever saw on blocks and in 
baskets, with Bulbosa, another alpine kind; also 
Citrina, reversed, that is, with the roots up against the 
roof, and the bulbs and leaves hanging down perpen¬ 
dicularly, or nearly so. This squares with the Messrs. 
