1959 
* MEGACLINIUM maximum. 
Largest Megaclinium. 
GYNANDRIA MONANDRIA. 
Nat. ord. ORCHIDACEX, $ MALAXIDEX. | 
MEGACLINIUM. Supra, vol. 12. fol. 989. 
M. maximum ; sepalo supremo acuto lateralibus margine involutis acuminatis- 
simis reflexis, labello lineari revoluto. 
M. maximum. Lindl. gen. $ sp. Orch. p. 47 ; sine char. 
Facies herbe feró M. falcati, sed paulo robustior, et folia minüs emargi- 
nata et margine subrevoluta. Rachis ensiformi-falcata, dentata, multiflora, 
9 poll. longa, pallidè viridis. Flores herbacei. Pedicelli et calyx extus san- 
guineo-maculati. Sepalum supremum erectum, oblongum, acutum, denticula- 
tum, utrinque callosum, lateralibus duplò longius ; lateralia triangularia, e 
latá basi acuminatissima, reflexa, marginibus involutis. Petala parva, plana, 
linearia, acuta, pallidè viridia. Columna lata, discoidea, tenuis, marginata, 
basi cum labello lineari fusco revoluto mobili elasticè articulata. Anthera 
unilocularis. Pollinia 2 solida, geminata, nec lobata nec lined exaratá. 
Nearly a thousand plates ago, the first species of this 
most singular genus was published in the present work. At 
a later period I found the imperfect remains of a second in 
the Banksian Herbarium, collected by Smeathman in Sierra 
Leone; and this has at last been added to our gardens by 
the correspondents of the Messrs. Loddiges, in whose collec- 
tion the drawing was made in August last. 
In general appearance it is a good deal like M. falcatum, 
from which species it differs, in having larger leaves, which 
are less deeply notched at the point, and more revolute at 
the edges; in its larger sabre-shaped rachis, which 18 as 
much as nine inches long ; and in the form of all the parts 
* From peyac large, and «Aivn a bed, in allusion to the broad, sword-shaped 
bed or rachis of the flowers. 
