Marginata.—White of sepal and petal. It takes its name from the white margin surrounding the crimson purple lip. Very striking also is a large white triangle upon the disc, charmingly netted over with crimson.
Archduchess is faintly rosy. The lobes, closely folded, are deepest purple-crimson, over an orange throat. On either side the dark central line of the labellum is a pale blur.
Macfarlanei.—Sepals and petals very narrow, of a clear rose tint, with darker lines. A patch almost white in the front of the dark crimson lip.
Lowiana.—Petals rose, sepals paler. The tube is not large, but it, and also the labellum, could not be darker if still to be classed as crimson. Even the yellow of the throat is obscured, but there is a lighter blotch at the tip.
Tenebrosa.—The name is due apparently to branching lines of deep maroon which intersect the crimson lip. Petals and sepals are white, and there is a white patch on the labellum.
The Dendrobium House
is the last in this series, where we see the usual varieties in perfection; there are pseudo-bulbs of Wardianum more than 4 feet long. At the present day, however, orchidists will not look at ‘usual varieties’ of Dendrobium with patience—nobile, cupreum, fimbriatum, thyrsiflorum, etc. etc. etc. They are exquisitely lovely, of course. Examine them as often as you will, new marvels of beauty appear. The fact is that most experts never do examine these common things; they look about for varieties. Such blasé souls can be accommodated, if needful. Here are specimens of nobile album, all white save the deep crimson blotch and a faint yellowish tinge upon the lip; nobile virginale, which has lost even this trace of colour; nobile murrhinianum, very rare, understood to be a hybrid with Wardianum, snow white, the tips of sepal, petal and lip purple, and a great purple blotch in the throat; nobile Cooksoni, no hybrid, but a sport, in which the ordinary colouring of the lip is repeated in the petals; nobile Ruckerianum, very large, the deep blotch on the lip bordered with white; nobile splendens grandiflorum, an enlarged and intensified form of the type.
Of hybrids I may name Leechianum (nobile × aureum), white, sepals, petals, and lip tipped with rosy purple, the great blotch on the disc crimson with a golden tinge. Ainsworthii, of the same parentage and very similar, but the blotch is wine-colour. Schneiderianum (Findleyanum × aureum), bearing white sepals, petals and lip tipped with rosy purple, throat orange, similarly striped.
Here are several ‘specimens’ of Epidendrum radicans, a tangle of fresh green roots and young shoots of green still more fresh and tender, pleasant to look upon even though not flowering; but verdant pillars set with tongues of flame at the right season. And an interesting hybrid of it, Epidendrum × radico-vitellinum (radicans × vitellinum),—brightest orange, the lip almost scarlet, with three yellow keels upon the disc; very pretty and effective.