1880. ] 
CHOICE WINTER FLOWERS.—PEAR PROGENITORS. 
35 
of attention. The question of the atmospheric 
humidity to be maintained in orchid-houses is also 
included in this chapter. 
Chapter 7 tells of the diseases which beset this 
group of plants, and the remedies to be adopted; 
and also of the enemies which prey upon them, and 
the means of preventing their attacks. Chapter 8 
relates to specialities of treatment, including their 
cultivation in the living-room, and for exhibition 
purposes. This concludes the first portion. 
The second part of the work is taken up by a 
“descriptive review” of the orchids cultivated in 
Europe, arranged alphabetically under their generic 
names. This section, which occupies about 70 pages, 
would very well bear further elaboration. It would 
be useful to most of those who are likely to require 
a book of this kind, to have before them some in¬ 
dication of the tangible distinctions between the dif¬ 
ferent genera, and more especially between the 
various species, where these are numerous. A 
synoptical table of the species of each genus, con¬ 
structed so as to bring out some of the leading 
characteristics of which cultivators would like to be 
informed, would very much improve this division of 
the book, and should it reach, as we hope it may 
do, another edition, the author would do well to 
supply it. 
The third part consists of fifty chromolithographs, 
arranged in alphabetical order, each being accom¬ 
panied by a page of letterpress, giving a brief 
popular description of the species figured, and some¬ 
times noting a few of the more popular of its allies. 
The plates are, on the whole, fairly well done ; some 
are very good, a few rather weak and faulty in the 
colouring, but generally recognisable as portraits of 
the respective species. The chief objection we see to 
them is that a number of them are reduced from the 
natural size, this being evidently done to bring the 
whole plant within the scope of the page. This mode 
of portraiture is, however, deceptive, notwithstand¬ 
ing that the proportions of the figure may be clearly 
marked, for the difference in a reduced coloured 
figure is never fully appreciated, as it is in a woodcut, 
and the consequence is that a lower estimate is 
formed of the merit of the plant so represented 
than is really due to it. There is this to be said, 
however, in favour of the plan, that it accords with 
that of what may be considered as the companion 
volume, Lcs Palmiers. 
It will be seen from this summary of the 
contents of Les Orchidees , that it forms a very 
important contribution to the literature of cul¬ 
tivated orchids. We know of no one publica¬ 
tion which goes so fully into the whole subject, 
and though there are, as we have said, some 
features which we should have preferred to have 
seen amplified, there is a full return, in text, in 
woodcuts, and in coloured illustrations, for the 
cost of the book. The publisher must cer¬ 
tainly be congratulated on having produced so 
handsome a v olume, at so reasonable a price ; 
and the author may equally be congratulated on 
having taken so firm a grasp of his subject, as 
to have brought together and elaborated so 
much information of interest and importance 
to the collectors and cultivators of orchida¬ 
ceous plants,—T, Moore. 
CHOICE WINTER FLOWERS. 
following few plants in flower just 
w (January) are worth the reminder 
at they are in their full beauty, and 
that it is worth any one’s while to have them 
in his collection. Lcelia superbiens is majesty 
itself ; it commands admiration, and is certainly 
one of the finest orchids in cultivation. It 
does best in a light, cool house, in pots of 
charcoal, surfaced with sphagnum. Five 
spikes of it in flower, 12-14 flowers on a 
spike, decorate nearly an entire house. 
Rhododendron Princess Roped commenced 
flowering in October, and will continue to bloom 
on for another month and more. This is a lovely 
pink Rhododendron, and the fact of its flowering 
in the dullest months of the year, without any 
but ordinary culture, stamps it as a most valu¬ 
able and serviceable plant. It has a rounded, 
robust habit, and grows and flowers in a 
matter-of-fact manner, without aid or guidance. 
The major variety of Odontoglossum pid- 
chellum is another January beauty, purity 
itself, with its arched white spikes of sweet- 
scented flowers 15 in. long. The largest num¬ 
ber of flowers we have had on one spike this 
year was fourteen, each quite an inch in dia¬ 
meter. If there is one plant more than 
another with which one is in danger of falling 
in love with, it is this gem. 
My eye rests on another plant— Rogiera 
gratissima —which is always in flower, always 
beautiful, and contented in a temperate heat; 
in a planted-out condition, it gives any quan¬ 
tity of laurustinus-like pink flowers, of which 
no one would become tired.—H. K., Tweedside, 
PEAR PROGENITORS. 
>N the course of a series of lectures pub- 
Gj p lished some short time since by the late 
Professor Karl Koch, the origin of our 
various fruits is one of the subjects treated on. 
The learned and travelled professor, in these 
lectures, mentions six species of Pyrns as the 
progenitors of our cultivated pears, namely, 
Pyrns sinensis , of Desfontaine, from China and 
Japan; P. cordata , of Desvaux, from France, 
&c.; P. Acliras , of Gsertner, from the steppes of 
Southern Russia, and naturalised in France and 
Germany; P. Sinai, of Desfontaine, from Syria ; 
P. elceagrifolia , of Pallas, from north-east Asia 
Minor; and P. salicifolici of the younger 
d 2 
