It is worth mention that the first Flora medal offered by the Royal Horticultural Society for a seedling--a hybrid--in open competition was won by _Loelia Arnoldiana_ in 1891; the same variety took the first prize in 1892. It was raised by Messrs. Sander from _L. purpurata_ × _Catt. labiata_; seed sown 1881, flowered 1891.
And now for the actual process by which these most desirable results, and ten thousand others, may be obtained. I shall not speak upon my own authority, which the universe has no reason to trust. Let us observe the methods practised in the great establishment of Mr. Sander at St. Albans.
Remark, in the first place, the low, unshaded range of houses devoted to hybridization, a contrast to those lofty structures, a hundred yards long or more, where plants merely flourish and bloom. Their span roofs one may touch with the hand, and their glass is always newly cleaned. The first and last demand of the hybridizer is light--light--eternally light. Want of it stands at the bottom of all his disappointments, perhaps. The very great majority of orchids, such as I refer to, have their home in the tropics; even the "cool" Odontoglots and Masdevallias owe that quality to their mountaineering habit, not to latitude. They live so near the equator that sunshine descends almost perpendicularly--and the sun shines for more than half the year. But in this happy isle of ours, upon the very brightest day of midsummer, its rays fall at an angle of 28°, declining constantly until, at midwinter, they struggle through the fogs at an inclination of 75°. The reader may work out this proportion for himself, but he must add to his reckoning the thickness of our atmosphere at its best, and the awful number of cloudy days. We cannot spare one particle of light. The ripening seed must stand close beneath the glass, and however fierce the sunshine no blind may be interposed. It is likely that the mother-plant will be burnt up--quite certain that it will be much injured.
This house is devoted to the hybridizing of Cypripediums; I choose that genus for our demonstration, because, as has been said, it is so very easy and so certain that an intelligent girl mastered all its eccentricities of structure after a single lesson, which made her equally proficient in those of Dendrobes, Oncidiums, Odontoglots, Epidendrums, and I know not how many more. The leaves are green and smooth as yet, with many a fantastic bloom, and many an ovary that has just begun to swell, rising amidst the verdure. Each flower spike which has been crossed carries its neat label, registering the father's name and the date of union.