MR. H. BOLUS ON SOME CAPE ORCHIDS. 287 
Avicers, Lindl. 
Aviceps is a genus founded by Lindley (Gen. and Sp. Orchid. 
p. 345) on a plant which he believed to be identical with Thun- 
berg's Satyrium pumilum, Flor. Cap. ed. Schultes, p. 19. But 
Lindley, finding no petals, concluded that Thunberg was mistaken, 
and that the deficiency constituted a valid generic distinction. 
I have not had any opportunity of examining an authentic 
specimen of Thunberg’s, or of the plant which Lindley had 
before him, and believed to be identical with it. The specimens 
in the Kew and Lindleian herbaria are scanty and in bad condi- 
tion. In the former, together with a single plant from Drége’s 
collection marked Aviceps pumila, are mounted several specimens 
of a Satyrium of the ordinary typical structure, which is well 
known to me, though it is not, so far as I know, described, and 
in external appearance strikingly resembles the plant marked 
Aviceps. 
Since my return to Cape Town I have examined some recently 
gathered flowers, preserved in spirits of wine, of a plant which I 
can hardly doubt is Thunberg’s Satyrium pumilum, and also 
Lindley's Aviceps pumila. This shows that Thunberg’s descrip- 
tion, drawn in all probability from the living plant, was fairly 
correct, and that Lindley, working from dried specimens, was 
mistaken*. 
In fig. 4 (p. 238) A shows the flower viewed laterally, with 
its subtending bract; B the flower from beneath; C the three 
sepals s, and the two small lateral faleate petals p, the whole 
consolidated for the greater part of their length into a single 
oblong fleshy piece, which is furrowed and tuberculate above, 
While atthe base is a bossy appendage a, which appears to serve 
the purpose of forcing-up an insect entering to rifle the nec- 
taries against the glands of the pollinia, which are borne upon 
the highly arched column. D and E show the column and stigma. 
Lindley observes (J. c. p. 346) .—" I think this plant must be 
Thunberg’s Satyrium pumilum ; but he speaks distinctly of the 
petals of that species under the name of *laeinize dus interiores 
* This is not the first time that Thunberg's accuracy has been vindicated ; 
and it reminds me of a remark of Ernest Meyer in the Preface to his Com- 
mentaries on Dröge's Plants, p. vii :—“ Id vero tacere nolim, plerasque Thun- 
bergii descriptiones longe meliores esse, quam vulgo xstimantur. Fructifica- 
tionis partes ssepius negligere, verum est, sed eo melius habitum referre solent ; 
et ubi nimis longe a natura aberrare videntur, mallem credere, diversas diver- 
sorum plantas commutatas, quam a Thunbergio tam graviter peccatum esse." 
