THE ROMANCE OF ORCHID COLLECTING.

Otago Witness, Issue 2106, 5 July 1894, Page 42

THE ROMANCE OF ORCHID COLLECTING.

Some Facts About a Fashionable Cbazh.

There is no real justification for surprise at tbe sometimes fabulous prices paid for orohids. Tbe coat of obtaining them is co great, both in money and in human life, that the wonder really is they are so cheap. And some orchids are oheap, Yon can stock a greenhouse with specimens of a hundred varieties bought as an average of half a orown apiece. Bat you Oan also spend wj many guineas as there ate days in the year on one ugly little bulb which is the sole representative of a new spacies or variety ; or which is A departure from the established type of a known Variety, either in colour or in some other detail. These are the orchids which daring men seek in almost unknown regions. The adventures attending the search would fill many books. Generally Germane, but sometimes Frenchmen or Englishmen, the collectors must have tbe patience of Job, the courage of Nelson, tbe lingual fluency of a courier, and the knowledge cf a professor of science ; combined with power to endure years of hardship.

Same years ago a collector for an Eoglish firm was sent to New Guinea to look tor a deudrubium, then very rare, lie went to tbe cou"t>y, dwelt ainotg the natives for months, faring as they fared, and living under very trying conditions, and he found about 400 oE the plants. He loaded a little schooner with them ; but he put into a port in Dutch New Guinea, atd the ship was burnt to the water's edge. He was ordered to go b&ok for more, and he did. rie foutd a magnificent collection of tbe orchids in a native burying gruuid, growing among exposed banes and tkulls. After muoh hesitation, the natives allowed him to remove the orchids, some of them still in the skulls, and gent with tbe consignment a little idol, to

watch over the spirits of the departed. Little wonder that these plants sold at prices ranging from sgs up to 25gs each. The dangers of the collector's task are terrible. Eight naturalists seeking various specimens in Madagascar once dined at Tamatave, and in one yeas after there was but a single survivor. Even this favoured person was terribly affl'cted, for, after a sojourn in the most malarious swamps, he spent 12 months in hospital, and left without Lope of restored health. Two collectors seeking a single plant died one after tbe other of fever. A collector detained at Panama went to took for an orchid he had heard of ; and the Indians brought him back from the swamps to die. A man who insulted a Madagascar idol was soaked with paraffin by the priests and burnt to death. Mr Frederick Beyle shows that these dangers must be encountered invariably, if rare or new orchids are to be found, for he speaks of one which " clings to the very tip of a slender palm in swamps which the Indians themselves regard with dread as the chosen home of fevers aud mosquitoes."

And the difficulties of the work are as great as its dangers. One collector was known to wade up to his middle in mud fora fortnight seeking for a specimen of which he had heard ; another lived among Indians for eight months, looking in untracked forests for a lost variety. To obtain the orchids which grow on trees, the collector mu3t hire a certain area of woodland with the right to fell the timber. The natives cannot be trusted to climb to the summits and gather the plant?, and the collector cannot spare the time. So the wasteful plan of felling the trees is adopted ; natives are employed to do the work, and the collector gathers his specimens from the fallen trunks. This, however, generally takes place far inland ; the plants have then to be brought horce. In one case they had to be carriei six weeks on men's backs from the mountains to tbe E ssequibo river ; then carried six weeks in canoes, with 20 portages, to Georgetown ; then to England over the ocean. Mr Boyle talks of a journey to tbe Rorairaa mountain as quite easy travelling, yet it involves 32 loadings and unloadings of cargo; and in another direction '_' one must go in the bed of a torrent and on "the face of a precipice alternately for an uncertain period of time, with a river to cross almost every day." Moreover, after all this trouble, the specimens often die on the .journey, and tbe speculator has to risk the loss of £1000 on a single cirgo. What wonder that orchids are often dear ?

Yet it is not so much the difficulty and danger which make them dear as rarity or peculiarity. Amongst a lot of the commonest orchids, some years ago, was found a plant similar to the. rest in eve»y characteristic except the colour of its stem, which was green instead of brown. When it flowered, the bloom should have been green ; but it was golden, and the plant became in consequence practically priceless. It was divided into two parts, and one was sold to Baron Schroeder for" 72gs ; the other to Mr Measures for lOOgs. This latter piece was several times divided, selling for lOOgs each time ; but Baron Schroßder's piece was never mutilated, and is now worth lOOOgs I It would bring that sum, say the authorities, in the public saleroom. The good fortune of orchid buyers is sometimes remarkable. Bulbs which have not flowered, and give no sign of peculiarity, are often treasures in disguise. An amateur once gave 3fr on the Continent for an Odontoglossum ; it proved to be an unknown variety, and was resold for a sum exceeding £100. Another rarity, bought with a lot at less than Is each, was resold for 72gs to Sir Trevor Lawrence, who has one of the finest collections, if not the finest, in England. A Cattleya, developing a new and beautiful flower, at once advanced in value from a few shillings to 250gs ; it was afterwards sold in five pieces for 700gs. Simply because its flower has proved to be white instead of the normal colour, 280gs have been given for a Cattleya ; and hundreds of guineas are available at this present moment over and over again for rare or extraordinary orohids either in private collections or in the market. A plant no bigger than a tulip bulb has been sold for many times its weight in gold ; and " a guinea a leaf " is a common, and often inadequate, estimate of the worth of rarities. Only quite recently there was something in the nature of a pilgrimage of orchidists to the hothouses of Messrs Sander and Co , of St. Albans, where a wonderful new orobid was on view. It is named " Miltoniopsis Bleni Nobilus," and oarried 16 blooms, each nearly Sin in diameter. The colour is a flesh white, two rose wings of coloiw spreading laterally, and in the centre of each blossom is a blotch of cinnamon tint with radiating lines. But it is altogether indescribable in the exquisite beauty of its hues. Nature has rarely been so lavish as over this gem, It is the newest and probably the most magnificent q£ all orchids. The orchid mania is not diminishing j on the contrary, it is more active now than ever it was, la spite of the Constant rials of loss, and the inevitable difficulties and dangers of the enterprise) one nurseryman in this oountry devotes himself entirely to the orchid trade. He deals in nothing but ordhidP) and trusts to the high price which the dollectors will pay for a rarity to recompense him for the expenses of the collectors' journeyj and the losses which occur in the transfer of the plants from one continent to another. And there must be rarities for many years to come ; because, although there are some 2000 varieties of orchids in cultivation, it is estimated that there are probably 10,000 in existence, could they all be found. — Chamber's Journal.