ect, 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. Mr. Sander has had his turn, and has
enjoyed the satisfaction of discovering species closely allied, as
_Eucharis Mastersii_ and _Eucharis Sanderiana_; but the old-fashioned
bulb is still to seek.

In this third greenhouse is a large importation of _Cattleya Trianae_,
which arrived so late last year that their sheaths have opened
contemporaneously with _C. Mossiae_. I should fear to hazard a guess how
many thousand flowers of each are blooming now. As the Odontoglossums
cover their stage with snow wreaths, so this is decked with upright
plumes of _Cattleya Trianae_, white and rose and purple in endless
variety of tint, with many a streak of other hue between.

Suddenly our guide becomes excited, staring at a basket overhead beyond
reach. It contains a smooth-looking object, very green and fat, which
must surely be good to eat--but this observation is alike irrelevant and
disrespectful. Why, yes! Beyond all possibility of doubt that is a spike
issuing from the axil of its fleshy leaf! Three inches long it is
already, thick as a pencil, with a big knob of bud at the tip. Such
pleasing surprises befall the orchidacean! This plant came from Borneo
so many years ago that the record is lost; but the oldest servant of the
farm remembers it, as a poor cripple, hanging between life and death,
season after season. Cheerful as interesting is the discussion that
arises. More like a Vanda than anything else, the authorities resolve,
but not a Vanda! Commending it to the special care of those responsible,
we pass on.

Here is the largest mass of Catasetum ever found, or even r