236 OrchidecE. {Disperis. 



Also in Khasia and liurma. 



The Fl. B. Ind. has a var. brevifolia with very short leaves, the radical 

 ones linear-oblong, found by Walker and Gardner. 



Some allowance must be granted for probable errors in my descriptions 

 of this and other small flowered Habenaria:, these having been drawn 

 up fiom dried specimens, without the aid of good figures. — J. D. H. 



59. DISPERIS, Sw. 



Terrestrial, leafy, tuberous herbs ; tubers oblong, entire ; 1. 

 few, scattered, sessile, membranous ; fl. solitary or few, dorsal 

 sep. narrow, cohering with the broad pet. into a hemispheric 

 hood, lateral spreading or deflexed, each with a pit on the 

 face answering to a conical protuberance on the back ; pet. 

 semi-lunate, deflexed ; lip placed under the hood, confluent 

 with the column to above the position of the anth.; column 

 short, contracted below ; anth. dorsal, oblong, 2-cclled, polHnia 

 of 2-4 series of cuneiform grains on a rhachilla, caudicles 

 long, twisted, glands large, naked ; rostellum dilated into a 

 hyaline membrane with 2 arms that end in twisted linear tails. 

 — Sp. about 20 ; 2 in Fl. B. Ind. 



D. zeylanica, Trim, in Jouni. Bot. xxiii. 245 (1885). 

 D. tripctaloidca., Lindl. Gen. and Sp. Orch. 371 (part); Thw. Enum. 

 3H. C. P. 2363. 



Fl. B. Ind. vi. 169. Wight, Ic. t. 930 (from a Ceylon specimen). 



Stem 6-10 in., erect, slender, few-leaved ; tuber ^-l in. 

 long, oblong or ovoid ; 1. i or few, small, distant, 'i-\ in. long, 

 sessile, ovate, acute, base cordate-amplexicaul, very obscurely 

 3-5 veined from base to tip ; fl. few, subcorymbosely racemose, 

 \ in. broad ; bracts large, foliaccous, spreading ; ov. with very 

 short pedicel \ in., slender, striate ; fl. 2-lipped, upper lip com- 

 posed of narrow dorsal sep. and 2 broader pet. completely 

 connate, forming an incurved concave hood ; lower (false) lip 

 (looking like labcllum) of 2 broad lateral sepals connate at 

 base each \ in. long, semi-ovate, acute, slightly falcate, with 

 a linear depression in the centre prominent beneath ; lip very 

 small, stiffly erect under the hood, at base connate with the 

 column and thus appearing to be at its top, bifid, with 2 long 

 linear curved arms set with minute yellow papilhe, and with 

 a linear appendage, which is dilated and bilobulatc at the 

 apex projecting from the sinus ; column very short, base with 

 a 2-lippcd deflexed appendage; anth. large, 2-celled; in front 

 of anth. is a broad, erect, concave membrane produced at base 

 into 2 linear flat-twisted processes ; pollinia not seen. 



