MALAXIDEJE. DENDROBIEZE. 93 
I cannot conclude my account of the tribe of Orchideous plants with 
waxy pollen-masses destitute of glands and other secreting apparatus, 
without adverting to the genus Angrecum. I adopted this genus, some 
years since, from M. Du Petit Thouars, and published it in my Collectanea 
Botanica, t. 15. referring to it a plant, A. maculatum, found equally in 
Brazil and on the West coast of Africa, and now very common in the hot- 
houses of England. I described the pollen masses of this plant as desti- 
tute of a gland, and my drawing was in conformity with that description. 
I subsequently examined an imperfect living specimen of a Sierra Leone 
plant which I believe to be the Limodorum luridum of Afzelius, and which 
is in all probability also an Angrzcum, and I took the pollen masses to be 
be as I had before seen them in my Angr. maculatum, that is to say des- 
titute of a gland. In a memoir upon the Orchideous plants of the Mau- 
ritius and neighbouring islands, published in 1828, M. Achille Richard, 
who has examined specimens of several of Du Petit Thouars's Angre- 
a €ums, expressly declares that in all these there is no gland, he says he has 
not seen any thing like caudicula (which is never found without a gland) 
in any one of them. Hence it would seem that no fact can be supported 
by more conclusive testimony than that Angraecum belongs to Malaxidez; 
and yet this testimony I distrust so much that, without absolutely reject- 
ing it, I cannot receive it; and for the following reasons. In the first 
place, I now know that my observation upon A. maculatum was incorrect; 
that plant has distinctly both a caudicula and gland; secondly, Du Petit 
ouars in some cases, as t. 81. (Conia Auberti m.) distinctly represents 
the pollen masses with glands, of which however M. Achille Richard de- 
nies the existence. Now in this case I prefer the evidence of M. Du Petit 
Thouars whose figure was taken from a fresh specimen. In the third 
place, M. Ach, Richard states that there is no gland in Angrecum gladii- 
folium ; this happens to be the only Isle of France species I possess, and 
in my specimens I find a gland from which the pollen masses have fallen. 
ourthly, the manifest close affinity between the Isle of France Angrecums 
and the Limodorum falcatum of Japan, and my Aeranthes grandiflorum, 
in both of which glands undoubtedly exist, persuades me that they are not 
really different in structure. Finally, the genus Angrzcum has in some 
cases, as A. calceolus, caulescens, crassum, palmatum, &c. so completely 
the habit of the East Indian Aerides, that I feel great difficulty in believ- 
ing them to be essentially different in the structure of their pollen masses. 
This question can only be decided by a careful examination of good 
Specimens, of which I am entirely destitute. I recommend the enquiry to 
those Who are in possession of the requisite materials, or who are willing 
to oblige me by communicating them to me. 
