Dear Sir

I am sending off by this mail a small box containing a bottle with various curiosities concerning the impregnation of Orchids. There are flowers of Coryanthes, Stanhopea, Gongora & Catasetum. Further the insects which visit them a large humble bee & a very brilliantly colored Euglossa I believe.¹ Further flowers of Schomburgkia & the Epidendrum mentioned in former letters which does not open & notwithstanding is always impregnated.² One Coryanthes flower has the bee in the position it takes when forcing its way out.³ To fill up I have added some flowers of Norantea.⁴

With the humblebees with the pollinia of Catasetum on their back I have been unfortunate   I had three, two I tried to preserve dry which would not succeed, & the third which I put into Rum lost its pretty appendage, as happened also with one with the same organ on its back from Coryanthes.—⁵ The notes I have taken on these things I have incorporated into a paper on the subject which you will find in the same box.⁶ I have added a few remarks on the morphology of Orchids & the bearing the whole has on theory.⁷ I have also added a few sketches, illustrative of the subject.⁸ You will do with this paper what you think proper, if you think it worth publishing, it would perhaps best go to the “Natural History Review” which has some good botanists amongst its editors.⁹ If you think it is not fit for publication, I am still content. You will find perhaps that it is too full of Germanisms. I believe that the facts communicated in the paper are interesting although the deductions may be not approved of by all your countrymen.—

While reperusing the other day your book on Orchids,¹⁰ I recollected that bees in Germany where certain orchids are very common suffer from a disease called the “Kolbenkrankheit” “club disease” which consists of their body being beset with pollen masses to such an extent as to impede their movements. Does this disease not exist in England?—¹¹ One of the stalks of the Epidendron sent bears flowers which I recommend to your attention, the stigmatic cavity is quite terminal surrounded besides the anthers by five lobes of the column.¹² I am very sorry I did not see these flowers at an earlier stage.— In the observation of our orchids much remains to be done with regard to their insects, as the greater number of them live high up in the air the subject has its great practical difficulties   I do not think we know the insect which impregnates Stanhopea grandiflora.—¹³

I have failed in my experiments with native Ficus.¹⁴ Although I had them in very tight cambric bags the insects have found means to penetrate. I have not begun too late, as they were quite rudimentary & completely covered by their bracts when I tied the Bags on. But they contain much fewer insects than those which were not covered. The insects which perform the act of caprification appear not well known, the insect book I have refer the insect of the European Figs to Cynips, ours certainly do not belong to that Genus.¹⁵ I think all our Figs have their own insects, & some of them several species. In general I have had occasion again to verify what I advanced formerly that exotic figs have no insects & produce no good seeds.—¹⁶

From the paper I send you will find that some of my former notions about Catasetum were incorrect & that you had hit the thing exactly.¹⁷ I have looked in all these plants for nectar such as it is generally defined but I find none. I do not know if I wrote you in answer to your last,¹⁸ the surgeon you mention must be my friend Bradford,¹⁹ but he is certainly mistaken when he says that Catasetum tridentatum, ie the male flower bears seed.²⁰ I consider it simply impossible for reasons specified in my paper. Monachanthus is in my opinion, as I said formerly the female form of both Catasetum & Myanthus, & it will be found that the Catasetum form, if really found on the same spike with Myanthus is the transition from Myanthus to Monachanthus.—

I forgot to tell you that I am getting a layer made for you of Norantea, which I intend to send to Kew, where you can claim it when arrived.²¹ I have seedlings but they take too much time to come to flower   a layer will flower in 2–3 years.—

Have you seen the paper by Mohl I refer to in my essay?²² I have lately examined the flowers of Ruellia clandestina   the small ones behave certainly as Mohl indicates in that class of dimorphic flowers he treats of.²³ We have another Ruellia which does not flower now, but it also bears dimorphic flowers. I shall watch it. In General, as far as I can collect your ideas have not had the reception among German botanists which I thought I had a right to expect.²⁴ But the younger men are nearly all given to specialities, & the older such as Mohl & others belong to the “Parti de resistance”. You will perceive that I have frankly accepted your theory, as the one which connects better than any other phenomena hitherto unconnected. On the other hand I differ from you in the explanation of the Orchidean flower, & perhaps from all living botanists.²⁵ In general I am afraid the present generation of Botanists are shy of discussions of a theoretical description.—

I have addressed the box to the Messrs G. Dunlop & Co in Southampton,²⁶ I know from experience that if not addressed to the care of somebody there things are apt to be lost. The bottle contains a larger humblebee, which sometimes visits Catasetum etc, but which is more timid than the other, & driven away by it. The Euglossa I find appears to have a longer tongue in the living state, how is this to be accounted for?²⁷ If my time & money were not fully taken up by the “Amabilis”²⁸ I should like to learn a little more about insects, I wish somebody would take up the subject in this island, there is no end of variety of them.— I need not tell you again that I am as heretofore quite at your disposal if you should like to have some other things from this island for your studies. I hope you will receive the box & contents in safety, & to learn from you how it pleases you.

Very sincerely yours | H Crüger