Tas. 4591. 
PITCAIRNIA  exscapa. 
Stemless Piteairnia. 
a 
Nat. Ord. BRoMELIACE®.—HEXANDRIA MONOGYNIA. 
Gen. Char. (Vide supra, Tas. 4241.) 
PITCAIRNIA exscapa; caule brevissimo psendo-bulboso, foliis fere omnino radica- 
libus lineari-elongatis tenuissime longissime acuminatis integris, vaginis in- 
flatis margine superno ciliato-asperis, spicis radicalibus capitatis ovatis 
imbricatim bracteatis subsessilibus, bracteis lanceolato-acuminatis exte- 
rioribus calycibusque hirsutis spinis acicularibus nigro-fuscis intermixtis, 
petalis lineari-oblongis galeato-curvatis basi intus nectariferis. 
This very curious and rather handsome Pifcairnia was de- 
tected, as an infant plant, among some Orchidacez purchased 
from New Grenada, by Mr. Jackson of the Kingston Nursery, 
Surrey. They were carefully reared, and our figure represents 
two of them in a flowering state. The species is remarkable for 
the great length of the very attenuated leaves, and no less 
so for the sessile and densely bracteated spike of red flowers. 
I can nowhere find such a species described. It belongs, as far 
as the structure of the flower is concerned, to the same groupe — 
as Pitcairnia suaveolens, Lindl., figured in Botanical Register, 
t. 1069, that is to say, where the petals have a certain twist, 
occasioning their apices to point one way, and there is, moreover, 
a curvature there, giving a galeated character to these petals. 
We possess, from New Grenada, two other stemless and scapeless 
(or nearly so) Pitcairnias, and there, too, the bracteas are mixed 
with black spines: but in those the spines themselves bear 
short spreading spines on the sides. 
A kind of pseudo-bulb is 
Descr. Stemless: or nearly so. : 
formed at the base of the plant, sheathed by the dilated, dark 
brown bases of the outer leaves. ‘The /eaves, therefore, may be 
said to spring from the root; and are, many of them, full three 
feet long, like those of a coarse Carer, linear, carinated exter- 
nally and gradually attenuated into a very long narrow point, quite 
JULY Ist, 1851. 
