810 ON THE ORCHIDACEOUS GENUS DIDYMOPLEXIS. 
plexis pallens by reducing it to the very different Gastrodia 
javanica, Endl, syn. Epiphanes javanica, Blume, which, in 
addition to the structural differences pointed out, has flowers 
nearly four times as large. There is a second species of Didymo- 
plecis, which was collected in the Fiji Islands by the late Dr. 
Seemann, and described by Reichenbach* under the name of Ept- 
phanes micradenia. 
But, before tabulating the synonymy of the genus, I wish to 
call attention to the very remarkable elongation of the pedicels 
of Didymoplexis pallens after flowering, as represented in the 
accompanying drawing by Miss Smith. In the flowering stage 
the pedicels are no longer than the flowers, and the whole plant 
usually less than 6 inches in height. But after flowering, the 
pedicels grow out sometimes as much as a foot in length, in- 
creasing at the same time in thickness, so that a single pedicel 
becomes twice as large as the whole plant was during the flower- 
ing stage. These long pedicels are quite erect; and it seems that 
only the pedicels of the flowers which have been fertilized possess 
the singular property of elongating. Griffith does not mention 
it; and the only record I have found of it is by Kurzt. D. pal- 
lens is apparently not uncommon in Lower Bengal, growing 
about clumps of bamboos and in leafy wet spots; and the only 
use of this extension of the pedicel that I can suggest is that it 
carries up the ripening fruit above the decaying vegetable matter 
in which the plant grows. 
I should mention that it is a whitish leafless plant having a 
tuberous root, and is most likely a saprophyte or semisaprophyte. 
Griffith states that it grew about clumps of bamboos in the 
villages around Calcutta, whence it was introduced into the 
Botanic Gardens. The Coorg specimens upon which Wight 
founded his Apetalon minutum were also found under a clump 
of bamboos. These are all in a young condition, though in 
some of them the lower pedicels are beginning to elongate ; and 
I also find traces of the same thing in the Fiji species. I do 
not remember having seen quite this kind of adaptation in any 
other plant. Of course there are many plants the peduncles 
or pedicels of which elongate after the flowers have fallen, notably 
those which, like Arachis hypogea, bury their fruit underground, 
where it ripens. 
* Seemann’s ‘ Flora Vitiensis,' p. 295. 
t Seemann's Journal of Botany, 1866, p. 41 
