who will come into the woods, and
I cannot have more than eight or ten to work with, because when I should
not be continually behind them or ahead they do nothing. It is not a
question of money to do good here, but merely luck and the way one
treats people. The peons come out less for their salaries than for good
and plenty of food, which is very difficult to find in these scarce
times....

"The plants are here one by one, and we have got but one tree with three
plants. They are on the highest and biggest trees, and these must be
cut down with axes. Below are all shrubs, full of climbers and lianas
about a finger thick. Every step must be cut to advance, and the ground
cleared below the high trees in order to spy the branches. It is a very
difficult job. Nature has well protected this Cattleya.... Nobody can
like this kind of work."

The poor man ends abruptly, "I will write when I can--the mosquitos
don't leave me a moment."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: See a letter at p. 92.]

[Footnote 3: _Vide_ "Orchids and Hybridizing," _infra_, p. 210.]

WARM ORCHIDS.

By the expression "warm" we understand that condition which is
technically known as "intermediate." It is waste of time to ask, at this
day, why a Latin combination should be employed when there is an English
monosyllable exactly equivalent; we, at least, will use our
mother-tongue. Warm orchids are those which like a minimum temperature,
while growing, of 60 deg.; while resting, of 55 deg.. As for the maximum, it
signifies little in the former case, but in the latter--during the
months of rest--it cannot be allowed to go beyond 60 deg., for any length of
time, without mischief. These conditions mean, in effect, that the house
must be warmed during nine months of the twelve in this realm of
England. "Hot" orchids demand a fire the whole year round--saving a few
very rare nights when the Briton swelters in tropical discomfort. Upon
this dry subject of temperature, however, I would add one word of
encouragement for those who are not willing to pay a heavy bill for
coke. The cool-house, in general, requires a fire, at night, until June
1. Under that condition, if it face the south, in a warm locality, very
many genera and species classed as intermediate should be so thoroughly
started before artificial heat is withdrawn that they will do
excellently, unless the season be unusual.

Warm orchids come from a sub-tropic region, or from the mountains of a
ho