There are 505 plants in this house, and if individual flowers be not striking commonly--that is, flowers of the normal type--the spectacle is as pretty as curious when hundreds are open at once, apple-green, speckled with brown and tipped with white. But to my taste, as a 'grower,' the sight is pleasant at all seasons, for the green and glossy leaves encircle each pot so closely that they form a bank of foliage without a gap all round. But besides this house we have one much larger elsewhere, containing no less than 2500 examples of the same species. If no two flowers of an orchid on the same plant be absolutely similar, as experts declare--and I have often proved the rule--one may fancy the sum of variation among three thousand. Individually, however, it is so minute in the bulk of Cypripedium insigne that a careless observer sees no difference among a hundred blooms. I note some of the prominent exceptions.
_Clarissimum._--Large, all white, except a greenish tinge at base of the dorsal, and the broad yellow shield of the column.
_Laura Kimball_, on the other hand, is all ochreous yellow, save the handsome white crown of the dorsal and a narrow white margin descending from it.
_Statterianum_ is much like this, but spotted in the usual way.
_Bohnhoffianum_ has a dorsal of curious shape. The crest rises sharply between square shoulders which fold over, displaying the reverse. It has no spots, but at the base is a chestnut blotch, changing to vivid green, which again vanishes abruptly, leaving a broad white margin. Vivid green also are the petals, with brown lines; the slipper paler. This example is unique.
_Macfarlanei_ is all yellowish green, with a white crest.
_Amesiae._--The dorsal has a broad white outline and a drooping crest. To white succeeds a brilliant green, and to that, in the middle, bright chestnut. Chestnut lines also, and dots, mount upward. The green petals are similarly lined, and the slipper is greenish, tinged with chestnut.
_Longisepalum_ is flesh-colour, with a greenish tinge and pink spots on the very long dorsal. The pink spots change to lines upon the petals. Slipper ruddy green.
_Dimmockianum._--The broad and handsome dorsal is green, with white margin. A red stain at the base is continued in lines of spots upwards. The petals are scored with the same colour.