Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 15.djvu/661

 brought first to England, thence to the Museum at Paris in 1810, and lastly to Belgium; it is the species whose fruit possesses the strongest perfume.

The vanilla throve in greenhouses, but as it was sensitive to cold, and did not fructify, and its flowers possessed no ornamental interest, its culture was very limited. For a long time the only fruits which came to Europe were from Mexico, or the Gulf of Mexico—the only points where the plant was cultivated on a large scale, and where its fructification appeared to be insured. It remained for later experimenters to add to the interest attaching to this plant, while at the same time, in some degree, augmenting the resources of the colonies.

At this time the impression made by certain recent researches on fecundation in plants was still fresh, and the questions of hybridation and crossing were closely studied.

It has ever since been believed that the fecundation of the vanilla in Mexico and the neighboring countries, where that plant fructifies normally, was brought about by the agency of certain insects which hitherto do not appear ever to have been observed performing this function. The hypothesis is almost equivalent to a certainty, now that we know the habits of the Orchideæ, especially as regards reproduction.

The right of priority in discovering the artificial fecundation of the vanilla has been claimed for many countries. It belongs to England, say those who dwell on the other side of the Channel; but, if we are to believe the Belgians, the true discoverer was Charles Morren. Nevertheless it appears indisputable that Neumann, head-gardener at the Paris Museum of Natural History, was the first to obtain the results of this fructification in 1830. From a single stock Neumann produced, in that year, over two hundred vanilla fruits of excellent quality.

M. Delteil, pharmacist in the navy, in his interesting study of the vanilla ("Étude sur la Vanille," 1874), gives a list of the works which have been published concerning this plant, and treats of its culture in Réunion Island particularly. He states that in 1839 Perrottet, on his second voyage to Bourbon, made known to some of his friends among the planters the process adopted by Neumann; for, though the vanilla was cultivated as a curiosity, it did not bear fruit there any more than in Europe. Nothing appears to have come out of this suggestion; but the case was different with the discovery made about the same time