Jean Linden ( 1817 - 1898 )

Through the greatest share of orchid collecting honors was claimed by British horticulturist and botanists, many personalities from other countries were instrumental also in the discovery and introduction of new species . As orchid cultivation gained in fashionability in England , horticulturists in Belgium were quick to recognize that trade in tropical and subtropical orchids could be profitable . One of these enterprising men was Jean Linden , a native of Luxembourg who imported more than 1100 different species into Belgium.

While still a youth he moved to Belgium ,where he became one of the first students at the Faculty of Science in the newly founded University of Brussels . At the age of nineteen he was entrusted in 1835 by the Belgian government with a scientific mission to South America . Accompanied by Funck and Ghiesbrecht , he landed at Rio de Janeiro on 24 December of that year after an unpleasant three-month voyage. His explorations included trips to the provinces of Rio, Espirito Santo , Minas Geraes , and Sao Paulo. His collections from these regions were publicly exhibited in Brussels in 1837, at a period when interest in tropical plants was most intense . That same year he traversed both the north and west of Cuba and the following year the interior of Mexico , visiting all the eastern slopes of the Mexican cordilleras , the Peak of Orizaba ,the Anahuac Plateau , and the volcano Popocatepetl.

A complete account of all his wanderings would read like a journal because further explorations led him to a host of regions .Vera Cruz , yucatan ,Campeche , Chiaps ,and the Laguna de Terminos were included in his Mexican explorations. At the latter place he contracted a severe attack of yellow fever from which he barely recovered and which entailed a painful three-month convalescence . Scarcely had he regained his health when he journeyed by sea into Tabasco State , traveling thence to northern Guatemala (at that time in state of revolution) and returning along the Gulf of Mexico. Further trips took him to Havana ,the United States , many parts of Venezuela ,and Colombia . In all these areas he sought the mountainous regions ,solely occupied with ascertaining the possibility of growing orchids at cool temperatures.

In about 1841 a few English growers , including Mr. Backer of Birmingham , Mr. Rucker of Wandsworth , and the Rev.J. Clowes of Manchester , hired Linden to collect orchids for them in Colombia and Venezuela . Linden was Highly successful in this task ,discovering (among many other worthy plants) Anguloa clowesii and Anguloa ruckeri .The former was followed in Rev. Clowes' collection in 1844 and was thus seen for the first time in Europe.

On this expedition to the highest summits of the Venezuelan and Colombian Andes , Linden found orchids blooming in a region where teh temperature fell to the freezing point every morning . Concerning this discovery , he remarked many years later:

........ It was , however , only in the Cordilleras of the Venezuelan and Colombian Andes that my Orchid discoveries attained their greatest importance . From the time of Alexander von Humboldt, who only indicated a few species of Orchids, up to my arrival in the Andes ,the most brilliant representatives of the Cattleyas and Odontoglossums, as well as many other species of great merit , were still undiscovered . I had the good fortune to arrive first , but i was closely followed by Hartweg, travelling for the Royal Horticultural society of London. We met at Bogota, and it was during an excursion that we took together that we discovered , near Pacho, Odontoglossum crispum, which has excited the admiration of millions during the last few years. At the time of my journey , a certain number of more or less interesting Orchids were already in cultivation in Europe. They had been imported principally from the East Indies , Brazil , and Mexico , and their introduction was due to chance , rather than to careful search..... The Orchids once collected ,difficulties began. It was necessary to bring them down from the mountains to the port of embarkation by roads which cannot be imagined by any who have not traversed them . At that time no steamboat had yet crossed the ocean , and the poor plants had to endure the sea-voyage at the bottom of the hold of a rough sailing vessel , after having waited ,sometimes during more than a month , for a chance of carriage to a port near their destination . Packed like herring in a barrel,the heat and fermentation worked sad havoc , and but few of them arrived alive.

Altogether , ten years were spent in travels and botanical collecting , and in October 1845 Linden returned to the United States and Europe.

Linden later established himself as a nurseryman at Ghent but eventually returned to Brussels , where he founded the establishment known as Horticulture Internationale in conjunction with his son Lucien . In this nursery,which became a model for the profession ,Linden's knowledge of plants and the localities in which they grew natuarally proved invaluable . Direct competition with Messrs. Sander in England kept him alert in the search for new and desirable species ,resulting in the exploration of many far -flung regions where orchids might be found . His uncanny memory of plant locations , plus his characteristic refusal to divulge these locations, enabled him to command lofty prices for particularly attractive species . Linden was expert at camouflaging information about his sources ,which subsequently led to remarkable confusion concerning locations lonf after his decease. One of the trips he financed , an expedition to explore parts of the Amazon region and its most important tributaries -Tapajoz , Madeira , Rio Negro, Rio Branco , etc. -was recognized as one of the most important botanical ventures of the time .

Linden's recollections were so vivid that they served as the bases of directions followed by the numerous collectors he sent out on no less than seven expeditions tothe various districts which he had himself explored years before. Many of the orchids which honor him-Cattleyopsis lindenii, Maxillaria Lindeniae ,Odontoglossum lindeniii, Phalaenopsis lindenii,Phargmipedium lindenni, Polyrrhiza lindenii and Scaphyglottis lindeniana , to name a few -were discovered in those same regions .

Linden received a number of commendations and honors, from his own and several continental governments, for his contributions to horticultural literature . Among the illustrated works which he contributed to the expanding horticultural press were the Illustration Horticole and Lindenia, both of which were published continually for several years. In addition to the work of his pen and brush , Linden was also director of the Zoological Gardens at Brussels as well as consul for Luxembourg for some time .

He lived a long life , and though his death was not unexpected , when he died on 12 January 1898-at eighty-one years of age-his decease came as shock and with much sorrow.

References

Garden, the . 1879. Linden's Illustration Horticole .Vol. 15,no. 378.

Gardener's Chronicle . 1894. Jean Linden .Vol .15,no. 379.

Gardener's Chronicle . 1894. Jean Linden .Vol. 15, no. 385.

Gardener's Chronicle . 1898. 23 ,no. 577.

Richter,Walter . 1965. The Orchid World (English Translation). New York: E.P. Dutton& Co.