Note 91 — IDEAS FOR A PHYSIOGNOMY OF PLANTS.
Henry G. (Henry George) Bohn translation
p. 226—“Orchideæ.”
The almost animal-like form occasionally observed in blossoms of the Orchideæ is most strongly marked in Anguloa grandiflora, celebrated in South America as the Torito; in the Mosquito (our Restrepia antennifera); in the Flor del Espiritu Santo (likewise an Anguloa, according to Floræ Peruvianæ Prodrom. p. 118, tab. 26); in the ant-like flower of Chiloglottis cornuta;[OV] in the Mexican Bletia speciosa; and in the whole host of our remarkable European species of Ophrys: O. muscifera, O. apifera, O. aranifera, O. arachnites, &c. The taste for these splendidly flowering plants has so much increased, that the number of species cultivated by Messrs. Loddige, 313which, in 1813, was only 115, was upwards of 1650 in 1843, and in 1848, the number was estimated at no fewer than 2360. What a treasure of sumptuously flowering and unknown Orchideæ may be inclosed in the interior of Africa wherever there is an abundant supply of water! Lindley, in his beautiful work, On the Genera and Species of Orchideous Plants, 1840, counted exactly 1980 species; whilst Klotzsch at the close of the year 1848 counted 3545.
Whilst the temperate and cold zone possess only terrestrial Orchideæ, growing close to the ground, both forms, the terrestrial, as well as the parasitical, growing on the trunks of trees, are indigenous in the beautiful regions of the tropics. To the former class belong the tropical genera Neottia, Cranichis, and most Habenarias. But we have found both these forms as alpine plants on the declivity of the Andes of New Granada and Quito, viz., the parasitical (Epidendreæ) Masdevallia uniflora (at an elevation of 10,231 feet), Cyrtochilum flexuosum (at 10,103 feet), and Dendrobium aggregatum (at 9485 feet); and the terrestrial forms of Altensteinia paleacea, near Lloa Chiquito, at the foot of the volcano of Pichincha. Claude Gay is of opinion that the Orchideæ supposed to have been found growing on trees in the Island of Juan Fernandez and even at Chiloe, were probably only parasitical Pourretiæ, which advance as far south at least as 40°. In New Zealand, the tropical form of Orchideæ, hanging from trees, is still to be seen as far south as 45°. But the Orchideæ of Auckland and Campbell Islands (Chiloglottis, Thelymitra, and Acianthus), grow on level ground in moss. In the animal world there is at least one tropical form that penetrates further south. The Island of Macquarie (lat. 54° 39′) has an indigenous parrot, which lives therefore in a region nearer to the south pole than Danzig is to the north pole.[OW]