Yet we are all aware that our success is accidental, in a
measure. The general conditions which it demands are fulfilled,
commonly, in any stove where East Indian plants flourish; but from time
to time we receive a vigorous hint that particular conditions, not
always forthcoming, are exacted by Phaloenopsis. Many legends on this
theme are current; I may cite two, notorious and easily verified. The
authorities at Kew determined to build a special house for the genus,
provided with every comfort which experience or scientific knowledge
could suggest. But when it was opened, six or eight years ago, not a
Phaloenopsis of all the many varieties would grow in it; after vain
efforts, Mr. Thiselton Dyer was obliged to seek another use for the
building, which is now employed to show plants in flower. Sir Trevor
Lawrence tells how he laid out six hundred pounds for the same object
with the same result. And yet one may safely reckon that this orchid
does admirably in nine well-managed stoves out of ten, and fairly in
nineteen out of twenty. Nevertheless, it is a maxim with growers that
Phaloenopsis should never be transferred from a situation where they are
doing well. Their hooks are sacred as that on which Horace suspended his
lyre. Nor could a reasonable man think this fancy extravagant, seeing
the evidence beyond dispute which warns us that their health is governed
by circumstances more delicate than we can analyze at present.
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