The Woodlands Orchids Part 3

You may believe me that many more of these fine Cattleyas do not exist, and I can, after all, perhaps not find so good as may be in those you will now receive.

In the last years I have seen these plants in bloom, when I was so ill with fever, and in no other place can you get such a fine type.

The plants that I planted when I was taken ill no one found; no one has been here, and the plants had grown well and some of them very much rooted.

Trusting that all will arrive in good order, I remain, gentlemen, your very obedient servant,

CARL JOHANNSEN.

CATTLEYA MENDELII

The next division is styled the Mendelii house; more than three hundred large examples of this species--to be accurate and pedantic, it should be called a variety--occupy the centre, a hundred and eighty the stand to right.

Cattleya Mendelii lives in the neighbourhood of Ocana, New Granada, at an alt.i.tude of 3500 feet. It was introduced by Messrs. Backhouse in 1870, and named in honour of Mr. Sam Mendel, a great personage at Manchester in his day. Distinctions of colour are very frequent. Some p.r.o.nounce it the loveliest of Cattleyas.

Among the n.o.ble specimens here, many of them chosen for individual peculiarities, not half a dozen are named; the rest bear only letters showing their cla.s.s, and certain marks understood by the initiated. It will be a relief when this system, or something like it, becomes general.

And the time is not distant; at least, the privilege of granting new names at will must be restricted among those who obey the authorities.

The few plants here which enjoy a special designation are:--

_Monica Measures._--Petals rose, with a broad streak of purple down the centre from base to point. Sepals also rose, tipped with purple. Lip of darkest crimson, fringed.

_Lily Measures._--A very large flower, white of sepal and petal. On the lip, somewhat pale, as if to show it off, is a splash of purple-crimson, sharply defined.

_R. H. Measures._--Sepals and petals tinted with rose. Enormous lip, very dark crimson, fringed.

_William Lloyd._--For this I can only repeat the last description, yet the eye perceives a difference not inconsiderable.

_Mrs. R. H. Measures._--All white saving the yellow throat and two small touches of purple in the front.

_Duke of Marlborough._--This variety moved the great Reichenbach, as he said, to 'religious admiration.' No doubt it is the grandest of all Mendeliis--which is much to say; very large, perfectly graceful in form, exquisitely frilled. The colour of sepal and petal pink, the throat yellow, the spreading disc magenta-crimson.

The left side of the house is filled with large plants--some two hundred--of Cattleya Schroderae, which the learned recognise as a variety of Cattleya Trianae. It has the great advantage, however, of flowering in April, and thus, when discovered in 1884 by Arnold, collecting for Messrs.

Sander, it filled a gap in the succession of Cattleyas. Henceforward the careful amateur might have one variety at least in bloom the year round.

Named of course after Baroness Schroder. All Cattleyas are scented more or less at certain times of the day, but none so strongly as this, nor so persistently.

It does not vary so much as most of its kin, but it shows perhaps a greater tendency to albinism than any--as seems natural when its colours are so much paler. Among these grand plants we have three white, notably--

_Miss Mary Measures_, of which the picture is given.

Overhead hang smaller plants of Cattleya Mossiae, Trianae, Mendelii, and Laelia Lucasiana; among them no less than five Cattleya speciosissima alba.

Speciosissima Dawsonii is here also, finest of the coloured varieties--purplish rose of sepal and petal, lip large, yellow in the upper part, rosy crimson below, with margin finely fringed; and

Laelia pumila marginata.--In its ordinary form L. pumila is one of the loveliest flowers that blow, and admiration is enhanced by surprise when we observe how small and slender is the plant that bears such a handsome bloom. But this rare variety is lovelier still--its broad, rosy-crimson sepals and petals and its superb crimson lip all outlined with white.

CATTLEYA BOWRINGIANA

The third division of the Cattleya house contains, in the centre, some hundreds of Mendeliis; Cattleya Bowringiana on the right hand, Cattleyas Mossiae and Wageneri on the left; all 'specimen' plants, for health and vigour as for size.

Cattleya Bowringiana was imported fifteen years ago from British Honduras, but it has since been found in other parts of Central America. In colour--rosy purple, with deep purple lip, white in the throat--it does not vary much, nor in shape; at least I have not heard of any named varieties. But Cattleya Bowringiana in good health is always a cheering spectacle; its young growths push with such a demonstration of st.u.r.diness--having to rise much beyond the ordinary stature--and its bunch of eight or ten flowers stands so high above the foliage. Nowhere may that pleasant spectacle be enjoyed with more satisfaction than at Woodlands.

CATTLEYA MOSSIAE

Since Cattleya Mossiae was introduced more than two generations ago, and remains perhaps the commonest of the species, I need not describe it. Mrs.

Moss of Ottersfoot, by Liverpool, conferred the name in 1856. Love of orchids is a heritage in that family--so is the love of rowing. The lady's grandson, Sir J. Edwardes Moss, now living, was Stroke of the O.U.B.C. and at Eton, as were his father and his uncle. And the ancestral collection of orchids is still maintained.

White Mossiaes are not uncommon, though their exquisite beauty makes them precious in all meanings of the term.

_Mrs. R. H. Measures_ is best of all--a famous variety--white of sepal and petal. Deep and graceful frilling on the lip is always characteristic of this species; it reaches absolute perfection here. The yellow of the throat is much subdued, but purple lines issuing from it spread over all the white lip, with a very curious effect. Purple also is the frilling.

_Grandiflora._--Deep rose. Petals very broad, lip immense, finely mottled and veined with purple.

_Excelsior._--Blush-rose. Lip rosy purple, with a white margin.

_Gilbert Measures._--A superb variety. White with a faint flush. Sepals and petals unusually solid. Lip very widespread, with purple lines and splashes of magenta-purple.

_Gigantea._--Biggest of all. Rosy pink. The orange of the enormous lip and the frilling specially fine.

Catt. Wageneri, though granted a specific t.i.tle, is a variety of Cattleya Mossiae, from Caracas, discovered by Wagener in 1851; white, excepting a yellow blotch on the lip.

From the roof, among a hundred smaller plants of Cattleya, hangs a specimen of Laelia praestans alba, as rare as lovely--all purest white, except the lip of brilliant purple with yellow throat. Like many other orchids from the high lands of Brazil, this will grow equally well in the cool house. It is, in truth, a variety of L. pumila; its normal colour rosy purple.

CATTLEYA GASKELLIANA

The fourth compartment is given up to Cattleya Gaskelliana, a species from Venezuela, not showy, as a rule--though striking exceptions can be found, as here--but always useful. Like Cattleya Schroderae it filled a gap when discovered in 1883, for there was no species at the time which flowered in July. Its normal colour is mauve; the lip has a big yellow blotch and a mottling of purple in the front.

About four hundred plants are accommodated in this house, among them four albinos--one with eight pseudo-bulbs and two flowering growths. But the finest flower is

_Miss Clara Measures._--snowy white, of course, but with a lip like Cattleya Mossiae. Among others notable are:--

_Dellensis._--A n.o.ble variety. Mauve-pink--the petals immensely broad. The great spreading lip has a gamboge throat fading to chrome-yellow, intersected with lines of bright crimson. The crimson of the front is defined as sharply as if by the stroke of a paint-brush.

_G.o.dseffiana._--Pale rosy mauve. Petals immense. Lip a curious dusky crimson, with a narrow dusky-yellowish outline.

_Duke of Marlborough._--Gigantic. Sepals and petals bright rose; the broad lip has the same dusky outline.

_Measuresiana._--Very pale. The crimson of the lip, which is long but comparatively narrow, runs far up the throat, but leaving two clear yellow 'eyes' as distinct as in Cattleya gigas.

_Sanderiana._--Pale. The lip, of excellent colour, spreads so suddenly as to form a perfect circle.

_Herbertiana._--Mauve. A very compact flower. The bright yellow of the throat extends downwards and to either side of the lip in a very remarkable manner. The dusky margin surrounds a purple-crimson stain, scored with lines of deeper hue.

_Woodlandsensis._--Here the same oddity--due to natural hybridisation doubtless--is carried much further. The whole disc of the lip is buff, with only the merest touch of purple on either side the central line, and another, scarcely perceptible, at the tip.