or tapering upwards, more or less unequally bilobed at 
the apex, lobes sometimes toothed or slightly lobulate, 
often fleshy and sometimes V-shaped with a keel; in- 
florescences arising from the axils of the lower leaves, 
almost sessile, usually forming globular or ellipsoid 
densely-flowered heads but sometimes laxer and few- 
flowered; rhachis short, usually thick; bracts small or 
more frequently large, membranous or chartaceous and 
equalling the flowers; flowers mostly white, sometimes 
with green markings: sepals oblong, elliptical or lanceo- 
late, obtuse, laterals oblique; petals similar but usually 
narrowed in the lower part; lip oblong, ovate or almost 
orbicular in general outline with rounded apex and often 
widened at the base to form rounded rather indistinct 
lateral lobes, sometimes distinctly 8-lobed, front lobe 
usually undulate; spur straight or somewhat S-shaped, 
wide at the base, constricted in the middle and dilated 
at the apex, shorter than the ovary; column short or of 
medium length, semiterete; anther hemispherical, pro- 
duced in front into a short truncate appendage only par- 
tially covering the rostellum; pollinia 2, globose or py- 
riform, stipes either 2 distinct to the base or a single one 
more or less bilobed in the upper half, apex in either case 
broad and flattened, viscidium long and narrow, attached 
to almost the entire length of the rostellum; rostellum 
projecting downwards in the basal half and parallel with 
or slightly divergent from the column, then sharply 
curved upwards terminating in an acute apex, on re- 
moval of the pollinia cleft to the base into two sickle- 
shaped lobes; stigmatic cavity below the rostellum and 
almost covered by it. 
Type Species :— A. recurvus Finet. 
The following is an enumeration of the species of An- 
cistrorhynchus accepted here, with such synonymy as can 
[ 204 | 
