In those other cases the differing forms represent male and female sex, but the microscope has not yet discovered any sort of reason for the like eccentricity of this Renanthera.  Its proper inflorescence, as one may put it, is greenish yellow, blotched with brown, three inches in diameter, clothing a spike sometimes twelve feet long.  The first two flowers to open, however—­those at the base—­present a strong contrast in all respects—­smaller, of different shape, tawny yellow in colour, dotted with crimson.  It would be a pleasing task for ingenious youth with a bent towards science to seek the utility of this arrangement.

Orchids are spreading fast over the world in these days, and we may expect to hear of other instances where a species has taken root in alien climes like R. coccinea in Brazil.  I cannot cite a parallel at present.  But Mr. Sander informs me that there is a growing demand for these plants in realms which have their own native orchids.  We have an example in the letter which has been already quoted.[7] Among customers who write to him direct are magnates of China and Siam, an Indian and a Javanese rajah.  Orders are received—­not unimportant, nor infrequent—­from merchants at Calcutta, Singapore, Hong Kong, Rio de Janeiro, and smaller places, of course.  It is vastly droll to hear that some of these gentlemen import species at a great expense which an intelligent coolie could gather for them in any quantity within a few furlongs of their go-down!  But for the most part they demand foreigners.

The plants thus distributed will be grown in the open air; naturally they will seed; at least, we may hope so.  Even Angraecum sesquipedale, of which I wrote in the preceding chapter, would find a moth able to impregnate it in South Brazil.  Such species as recognize the conditions necessary for their existence will establish themselves.  It is fairly safe to credit that in some future time, not distant, Cattleyas may flourish in the jungles of India, Dendrobiums on the Amazons, Phaloenopsis in the coast lands of Central America.  Those who wish well to their kind would like to hasten that day.

Mr. Burbidge suggested at the Orchid Conference that gentlemen who have plantations in a country suitable should establish a “farm,” or rather a market-garden, and grow the precious things for exportation.  It is an excellent idea, and when tea, coffee, sugar-cane, all the regular crops of the East and West Indies, are so depreciated by competition, one would think that some planters might adopt it.  Perhaps some have; it is too early yet for results.  Upon inquiry I hear of a case, but it is not encouraging.  One of Mr. Sander’s collectors, marrying when on service in the United States of Colombia, resolved to follow Mr. Burbidge’s advice.  He set up his “farm” and began “hybridizing” freely.  No man living is better qualified as a collector, for the hero of this little tale is Mr. Kerbach, a name familiar among those who take interest