Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1889 edition. Excerpt: ... CATTLEYA MASSAIANA. plate 362. Native of Antioquicu, U.S. Colombia. Epiphytal. Pseudobulbs clavate, fusiform, monophyllous. Leaves oblong, obtuse, emarginate at the apex, some ten inches long, and upwards of two inches broad, thick and coriaceous in texture, and deep green. Scape issuing from a somewhat small sheath on the apex of the bulb, bearing several flowers, which are seven or more inches in diameter, and richly perfumed; sepals about four inches long and two inches broad, recurved at the tips, in colour a bright rosy mauve, paler towards the base; petals somewhat ovate, upper part contracted, afterwards spreading and undulated (this contraction is not, however, a fixed character), bright rose-colour, mottled and Hushed with white towards the base; lip subpandurate, some two-anda-half inches across, rolled over the column at the base, very deeply bi-lobed in front, and deeply lobed and frilled on the edge, anterior lobe rich magenta-crimson, the throat striped in the centre to the base with brownish crimson on a yellow ground, and bearing on each side a very large bright orange-yellow eye-like spot, the upper edge bordered with magenta-crimson. Column short, obtuse, included. Cattleya Massaiana, supra. We have figured many Cattleyas in the pages of this work, and amongst them have appeared some most beautiful species, varieties, and hybrid forms; of these one in particular, named Cattleya Hardyana, is especially noteworthy. It belongs to the Gigas section, and is a supposed natural hybrid between C. Dowiana aurea and C. giyas, as these two plants are found growing in the same district in the State of Antioquia in U.S. Colombia, and at the present time it still remains one of our rarest cultivated Cattleyas. The plant we here...
