218 
The Garden Magazine, May, 1924 
an elevation where snow lies during the winter months. Greater heat 
is required for C. Massangeana and C. Dayana with their pendent 
racemes of ochreous yellow and brown flowers. These are natives of 
Borneo, whilst C. Veitchii and related species, with flowers of the purest 
white, are from New Guinea. 
Closely related to Coelogyne, and by some authors united with it, 
is the genus Pleione often called Himalayan Crocus. These are curious 
tufted plants with flattened disc-like pseudo-bulbs and grow among 
moss on humus-clad rocks or tree trunks. They are deciduous and 
most of them flower before the leaves appear. The best known are 
P. lagenaria, P. maculata, and P. humilis. The genus extends north¬ 
ward and eastward into China and one species (P. pogonioides ) is 
common in Hupeh province, growing on rocks in the forest where it 
is covered with snow in winter. 
A genus of Orchids which in quite recent years has been enormously 
developed by the hybridist is Cymbidium. The genus is widely dis¬ 
tributed in the eastern tropics with members extended into the tem¬ 
perate regions of China and Japan. Some of the species are truly 
terrestrial, some grow on the tops of rocks and others are true epiphytes, 
growing usually in the forks of trees. One of the oldest and best 
known species is the Himalayan C. grandiflorum with its long, spread¬ 
ing racemes of flowers splashed and barred with rufous-brown, the lip 
yellow and crimson. Quite different in appearance are C. eburneum 
and C. Sanderae with their ascending almost upright flower-stems and 
few flowers, white in the former, spotted and barred with rose-red in 
the latter. These have proved of great 
service to the hybridist who, by crossing 
them with some of the older sorts which 
have spreading many-flowered racemes, has 
evolved a race of useful plants of wondrous 
beauty, whose flowers last for a month or 
six weeks. Perhaps the most inconspicuous 
member of the genus is C. ensifolium, a 
terrestial species common in many parts of 
China. This the Chinese regard as the king 
of flowers, its modest appearance and the 
delicate odor of its blossoms being con¬ 
sidered to represent the very essence of 
refinement. 
A common terrestrial Orchid in China is 
Bletilla hyacinthina, occasionally cultivated 
in our greenhouses and interesting as the 
plant in which Robert Brown discovered 
the cell-nucleus. Another and more widely 
known terrestrial Orchid is Phaius grandi- 
florus which grows in moist and boggy 
places from Hongkong southward through 
Malaysia to northern Australia and pres¬ 
ents much variation in the color of its 
flowers. In Yunnan and southward to 
Burmah grows Thunia Marshalliana and, 
in the neighborhood of Rangoon T. Ben- 
soniae with amethyst-purple flowers and 
frilled lip. 
The genus Calanthe is widely dispersed 
in the Orient, and quite a number of species 
grow in the forests of China and Japan, 
but the species most generally cultivated 
are from Burmah. From the neighborhood 
of Moulmien came Calanthe vestita in 1848 
and C. rosea in 1850 which, hybridized by 
John Dominy in 1856, resulted in X C. 
Veitchii, the most popular Calanthe of our 
gardens. This genus Calanthe is of excep¬ 
tional interest since by crossing C. falcata 
and C. masuca was raised the first hybrid 
Orchid to flower. The work was done bv 
John Dominy for Messrs. Veitch of Exeter. 
The plant flowered in 1.856 and was named 
X C. Dominii by Findley who commented 
that such work would drive the botanists 
mad. 
Very similar in appearance and quite 
closely related are Bulbophyllum and Cir- 
rhopetalum to which belong several hun¬ 
dred species, found from China south to 
Australia. They are epiphytes but fre¬ 
quently grow on humus-clad rocks where their dwarf habit suggests in¬ 
crustations of Lichen or small pebbles. The leaves are often mere scales 
and their functions are performed by the tuber-like pseudo-bulb. In 
an Australian species (B. minutissimum) the pseudo-bulb is hollow and 
has breathing pores (stomata) on the inner surface. The flowers are 
not showy, but those of some species like B. barbatum are fascinatingly 
curious. This has a small dull-colored flower with a relatively large 
fringed and ciliated lip so delicately poised that it moves up and down 
at the slightest air. Another and similar species is B. mandibulare,\ 
native of north Borneo. Some of the Cirrhopetalums have attractive 
small flowers arranged umbellately in a circle at the top of a short stalk 
and have a protruded straight lip suggesting the beak of a pelican. 
Some Philippine Beauties and a Giant of the Eastern Tropics 
N O GROUP of Orchids is more beautiful in blossom than the Phal- 
aenopsis or Moth Orchids of which some 35 species are known. 
One of the best known is the white-flowered P. Aphrodite, native of the 
Philippines and south Formosa. Very lovely too is P. Scbilleriana 
with rose-pink blossoms. The oldest known is P. amabilis which 
grows in Java, Borneo, and other islands and has large handsome 
flowers. This species was known to Rumphius as early as 1750 and 
is figured by him in his “Herbarium Amboinense.” 
A common Philippine species is P. rosea which grows in the hot val¬ 
leys in the neighborhood of Manila and has been much used by the 
hybridist. Less frequently seen in col¬ 
lections are the Sumatran P. violacea and 
P. sumatrana. All the Phalaenopsis have 
lovely flowers and in many species the 
strap-shape leaves are reddish below and 
prettily mottled on the upper side. 
Vanda is another fine genus with large 
fragrant flowers of many hues. Perhaps 
the most exquisite of all is V. coerulea with 
large flowers of soft light blue tessellated 
with azure. This is one of the gems of the 
orchid world and captivates all who see it. 
It was discovered by William Griffith in 
1837 on the Khasia Hills, but all attempts 
to introduce failed until 1850 when Thomas 
Lobb sent living plants to Messrs. Veitch 
of Exeter. A related species with pale lilac- 
blue flowers is V. coerulescens, native of 
upper Burmah. 
The well-known V. suavis and V. tricolor, 
natives of Java, were introduced into culti¬ 
vation by Thomas Lobb in 1846. Both 
have axillary racemes of thick fleshy flowers 
with a strong spicy odor. In V. suavis the 
flowers are white spotted with red-purple 
and the basal half of the lip is deep purple. 
The flowers of V. tricolor are similarly 
spotted on a yellow ground. From the 
Moluccas came V. insignis with tawny yel¬ 
low flowers spotted with dark brown and 
bright rose-purple lip. A Philippine species 
is V. Sanderiana with handsome flattened 
flowers, white flushed with buff yellow and 
reticulated with dull crimson. Very dis¬ 
tinct in habit are V. teres and V. Hooke- 
riana, both rambling plants with round 
cylindric leaves as thick as an ordinary 
pencil. These have red, white, and purple 
flowers in racemes but rarely appear in 
flower under northern skies. In Botanic 
Gardens of the eastern tropics they are seen 
to advantage, but the finest I have ever 
seen were growing in tubs and pots in the 
garden of Raffles Hotel in Singapore— 
scores of large plants receiving little or no 
care but bearing hundreds of racemes of 
their brightly colored flowers. 
Another plant 1 saw thriving to perfec¬ 
tion in the same garden was Renanthera 
coccinea. The Javan R. maiutina, with 
reddish and crimson flowers toned with yel¬ 
low and changing with age to orange-yellow, 
THE FAMOUS LOST ORCHID 
Singularly alert in carriage and almost truculently 
alive appears Cypripedium Fairieanum, a native 
of the mountains of Bhutan, a tiny Asiatic state 
touching the north-eastern rim of India. First 
introduced in 1857 and almost immediately lost, 
this Orchid was not rediscovered in its remote 
mountain home for nearly half a century 
