The manager, Mr. Bentley,
showed me a grand tapong-tree at his door from which he had lately
gathered a "blue orchid,"--we were desperately vague about names in the
jungle at that day, or in England for that matter. In a note published
on my return, I said, "As Mr. Bentley described it, the blossoms hung in
an azure garland from the bough, more gracefully than art could design."
This specimen is, I believe, the only one at present known, and both
Malays and Dyaks are quite ignorant of such a flower! What was this?
There is no question of the facts. Mr. Bentley sent the plant, a large
mass to the chairman of the Company, and it reached home in fair
condition. I saw the warm letter, enclosing cheque for 100l., in which
Mr. Templar acknowledged receipt. But further record I have not been
able to discover. One inclines to assume that a blue orchid which puts
forth a "garland" of bloom must be a Vanda. The description might be
applied to _V. coerulea_, but that species is a native of the Khasya
hills; more appropriately, as I recall Mr. Bentley's words, to _V.
coerulescens_, which, however, is Burmese. Furthermore, neither of
these would be looked for on the branch of a great tree. Possibly
someone who reads this may know what became of Mr. Templar's specimen.
Both the species of Renanthera need great heat. Among "facts not
generally known" to orchid-growers, but decidedly interesting for them,
is the commercial habitat, as one may say, of _R.
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