I will allow myself a very short digression here. It may seem
unaccountable that a plant of large growth, distinct flower, and
characteristic appearance, should elude the eye of persons trained to
such pursuits, and encouraged to spend money on the slightest prospect
of success, for half a century and more. But if we recall the
circumstances it ceases to astonish. I myself spent many months in the
forests of Borneo, Central America, and the West African coast. After
that experience I scarcely understand how such a quest, for a given
object, can ever be successful unless by mere fortune. To look for a
needle in a bottle of hay is a promising enterprise compared with the
search for an orchid clinging to some branch high up in that green world
of leaves. As a matter of fact, collectors seldom discover what they are
specially charged to seek, if the district be untravelled--the natives,
therefore, untrained to grasp and assist their purpose. This remark does
not apply to orchids alone; not by any means. Few besides the
scientific, probably, are aware that the common _Eucharis amasonica_ has
been found only once; that is to say, but one consignment has ever been
received in Europe, from which all our millions in cultivation have
descended. Where it exists in the native state is unknown, but assuredly
this ignorance is nobody's fault. For a generation at least skilled
explorers have been hunting.
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