MR. Q. BEKTHAM OX OBCHIDE^. 339 



very finely granular and mealy, and then sometimes at one period 

 with the granules so closely pressed together as to make it appear 

 waxy, or with coarse compound granules often regularly packed 

 in close rows, when it is termed sectile. It usually forms two 

 masses in each cell, or one deeply furrowed mass ; but the granules 

 are often so loosely attached that it is very difficult to distinguish 

 the masses except in a fresh state, and in some cases the granules 

 of each cell are but very slightly and irregularly connected by the 

 thin viscum. There are a very few genera, either among the 

 'Neottiese of the subtribe Diureae or among Epidendrese of the 

 subtribe Bletiese, where the granular and waxy pollen may appear 

 to pass from the one to the other, but when examined at the 

 proper stage of development there does not appear to be any really 

 close connection between the two tribes. The greater proportion 

 of the Neottieae are tropical ; but there are a few species of the 

 subtribes Spirantheae, Arethusese, and Limodorea? in temperate 

 regions of the northern hemisphere, a considerable number of the 

 subtribe Diuridese in extratropical Australia, and two genera of 

 Limodorese are extratropical in South America. 



Of the six subtribes here proposed, the first two are so strongly 

 marked in their vegetative characters that they might almost have 

 been united in a separate tribe, but that their structural characters 

 are not of a very high order, and not the same in the two- The 

 other four are much less definite in habit, and not always dis- 

 tinctly marked in character, but have appeared to me more natural 

 than the ten proposed in Lindley's ' Vegetable Kingdom,' of 

 which, moreover, no characters are given. 



Subtribe 1. Vakilee^:. — Of this and the following subtribes 

 the stems are tall, sometimes branched or with branched or at 

 once axillary and terminal inflorescences, and the leaves usually 

 larger, more coriaceous, or plicately ribbed than in the other sub- 

 tribes. The distinction between the two lies chiefly in that the 

 anther in Vanillea? is incumbent over the short rostellum, with the 

 pollen, as in Epidendreae, not affixed to any gland or stipes 

 detachable from the rostellum ; whilst in Corymbeae the anther is 

 erect behind the erect rostellum, and the pollen is, after dehis- 

 cence, affixed to a stipes descending from a detachable gland, 

 forming a pollinarium analogous to that of Vandeae. The Vanillea) 

 comprise five genera, of which two (Galeola and Vanilla) are 

 branching epiphytes, ascending sometimes to the tops of the 

 tallest trees, and three (Sobralia, Epistephium, and Sertifera) are 



