Odontoglossums, as I said, belong to America—­to the mountainous parts of the continent in general.  Though it would be wildly rash to pronounce which is the loveliest of orchids, no man with eyes would dispute that O. crispum Alexandrae is the queen of this genus.  She has her home in the States of Colombia, and those who seek her make Bogota their headquarters.  If the collector wants the broad-petalled variety, he goes about ten days to the southward before commencing operations; if the narrow-petalled, about two days to the north—­on mule-back of course.  His first care on arrival in the neighbourhood—­which is unexplored ground, if such he can discover—­is to hire a wood; that is, a track of mountain clothed more or less with timber.  I have tried to procure one of these “leases,” which must be odd documents; but orchid-farming is a close and secret business.  The arrangement concluded in legal form, he hires natives, twenty or fifty or a hundred, as circumstances advise, and sends them to cut down trees, building meantime a wooden stage of sufficient length to bear the plunder expected.  This is used for cleaning and drying the plants brought in.  Afterwards, if he be prudent, he follows his lumber-men, to see that their indolence does not shirk the big trunks—­which give extra trouble naturally, though they yield the best and largest return.  It is a terribly wasteful process.  If we estimate that a good tree has been felled for every three scraps of Odontoglossum which are now established in Europe, that will be no exaggeration.  And for many years past they have been arriving by hundreds of thousands annually!  But there is no alternative.  An European cannot explore that green wilderness overhead; if he could, his accumulations would be so slow and costly as to raise the proceeds to an impossible figure.  The natives will not climb, and they would tear the plants to bits.  Timber has no value in those parts as yet, but the day approaches when Government must interfere.  The average yield of Odontoglossum crispum per tree is certainly not more than five large and small together.  Once upon a time Mr. Kerbach recovered fifty-three at one felling, and the incident has grown into a legend; two or three is the usual number.  Upon the other hand, fifty or sixty of O. gloriosum, comparatively worthless, are often secured.  The cutters receive a fixed price of sixpence for each orchid, without reference to species or quality.

When his concession is exhausted, the traveller overhauls the produce carefully, throwing away those damaged pieces which would ferment in the long, hot journey home, and spoil the others.  When all are clean and dry, he fixes them with copper wire on sticks, which are nailed across boxes for transport.  Long experience has laid down rules for each detail of this process.  The sticks, for example, are one inch in diameter, fitting into boxes two feet three inches wide, two feet deep, neither more nor