Here
are a number of Hybrids of the "natural class," upon which I should have
a good deal to say if inexorable fate permitted; "natural hybrids" are
plants which seem species, but, upon thoughtful examination and study,
are suspected to be the offspring of kindred and neighbours. Interesting
questions arise in surveying fine specimens side by side, in flower, all
attributed to a cross between _Odontoglossum Lindleyanum_ and
_Odontoglossum crispum Alexandrae_, and all quite different. But we must
get on to the ninth house, from which the tenth branches.
Here is the stove, and twilight reigns over that portion where a variety
of super-tropic genera are "plumping up," making roots, and generally
reconciling themselves to a new start in life. Such dainty, delicate
souls may well object to the apprenticeship. It must seem very degrading
to find themselves laid out upon a bed of cinders and moss, hung up by
the heels above it, and even planted therein; but if they have as much
good sense as some believe, they may be aware that it is all for their
good. At the end, in full sunshine, stands a little copse of _Vanda
teres_, set as closely as their stiff branches will allow. Still we must
get on. There are bits of wood hanging here so rotten that they scarcely
hold together; faintest dots of green upon them assure the experienced
that presently they will be draped with pendant leaves, and presently
again, we hope, with blue and white and scarlet flowers of Utricularia.
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