chap. xvi. ACCEPTABLE COLLECTION OF PLANTS. 
443 
almost every day, and obtaining masses of a new species of 
platycerium, or stag’s-horn fern, I reached Tamatave in safety 
on the 12th of October, grateful for the protection from all 
accident or fever which I had experienced, and thankful 
to find myself so far on my homeward way. The house 
I had formerly occupied was again furnished for my use, 
and every assistance rendered by the authorities of the place. 
I paid the bearers whom the queen had provided the same 
amount as those hired on my former journey. 
While waiting here for a ship, I examined my plants, and 
found many killed by the sun and drought during the latter 
part of the journey. I placed those that were still alive in 
the shade, hoping to preserve them, and invigorate them for 
the voyage. Among these were a few plants of Epiphora 
pubescens; two of these I brought home, and one flowered 
last summer. In describing a flower which I sent, Dr. 
Lindley remarks, “ This little-known orchid is one which 
all lovers of what is beautiful and fragrant will eagerly 
welcome. Its smell equals the sweetest lilies of the valley, 
and its flowers are of the deepest golden yellow, most richly 
striped with crimson.” # 
I also visited a river about eighteen miles distant, to 
see the situations in which the Ouvirandra fenestralis grew, 
and found it in a sluggish river about twenty yards wide, 
and three or four feet deep in the centre, with a sandy, 
alluvial bottom, and a considerable deposit of sand and mud 
around the crowns of the plants, indicating that the deposit 
of soil brought down by the frequent rain from higher parts 
of the country formed a sort of top-dressing for the plants. 
A large plant which I procured and preserved, at Sir William 
Hooker’s suggestion, in a jar of spirits, is now in the museum 
of the Royal Hardens at Kew. 
Gardener s Chronicle , May 28, 1858. 
