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The plant may be moribund or dead, or it may be just a respectable purchase, fair value for your money, or perhaps for the thing has happened again and again there slowly unfolds before the delighted eyes of the happy purchaser, day after day, some new variety, some novel richness, a strange twist of the labellum, or some subtler colouration or unexpected mimicry.
This orchid has part of its labellum or lower lip hollowed out into a great bucket, into which drops of almost pure water continually fall from two secreting horns which stand above it; and when the bucket is half-full, the water overflows by a spout on one side.
When the bee begins to gnaw the labellum, he unavoidably touches a tapering projection, which, when touched, transmits a vibration which ruptures a membrane, which sets free a spring by which a mass of pollen is shot, with unerring aim, over the back of the bee, who then departs on his errand of fertilization. A very large class of plants are fertilized by means of insects.
Loelia elegans Statteriana is the finest variety perhaps; the crimson velvet tip of its labellum is as clearly and sharply-defined upon the snow-white surface as pencil could draw; it looks like painting by the steadiest of hands in angelic colour. C. g. Leopoldi has been found elsewhere. It is deliciously scented. I observed a plant at St.
And, behold! the trailing green spikes bore now three great splashes of blossom, from which this overpowering sweetness proceeded. He stopped before them in an ecstasy of admiration. The flowers were white, with streaks of golden orange upon the petals; the heavy labellum was coiled into an intricate projection, and a wonderful bluish purple mingled there with the gold.
Bull's Od. delectabile ivory white, tinged with rose, strikingly blotched with red and showing a golden labellum? or Mr. Sander's Od. Alberti-Edwardi, which has a broad soft margin of gold about its stately petals? Another is rosy white, closely splashed with pale purple, and dotted round the edge with spots of the same tint so thickly placed that they resemble a fringe.
Seen from the back, it shows a floriated cross of equal limbs; but in front the nethermost is hidden by a spreading lip, very large proportionately. The prevailing tint is a dun-purple, but each arm has a broad white tip. Dun-purple, also, is the centre of the labellum, edged with a distinct band of lighter hue, which again, towards the margin, becomes white.
The clustering flowers hang down, sepals and petals of dusky mauve, most gracefully frilled and twisted, encircling a great hollow labellum which ends in a golden drop. That part of the cavity which is visible between the handsome incurved wings has bold stripes of dark crimson. The species is interesting, too.
These changes of tone are not gradual, but as clear as a brush could make them. Botanists must long to dissect this extraordinary flower, but the opportunity seldom occurs. It is desperately puzzling to understand how nature has packed away the component parts of its inflorescence, so as to resolve them into four narrow arms and a labellum. But the colouring of this plant is not always dull.
The plant may be moribund or dead, or it may be just a respectable purchase, fair value for your money, or perhaps for the thing has happened again and again there slowly unfolds before the delighted eyes of the happy purchaser, day after day, some new variety, some novel richness, a strange twist of the labellum, or some subtler colouration or unexpected mimicry.
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