The old notion that orchids must have expensive houses and expensive skill before they can be successfully grown, has been very much against their culture. A few days ago we saw a Stanhopea with sixteen flowers expanded at once, and which simply had its basket hung under trees all summer; and here before us is a letter of a friend at Troy, N. Y., who says, "I commenced my collection as window plants, and grew them for several years just as other window plants. Now I have a small house for them, 30x18, and have six hundred plants".