220 OECHIDEtE 



short spike, which afterwards lengthens. The flowers are streaked, and 

 spotted more or less with purple, especially the lip, which is deeply lobed, 

 having the side-lobes rounded, and the middle lobe longest. It grows in 

 abundance on heaths and pastures where the soil is moist. Its leaves are 

 slender and distant. 



10. Pyramidal Orchis {0. pyramiddlis). — Lip with three equal lobes 

 and two tubercles at the base above ; lobes oblong, blunt as if cut off ; sepals 

 spreading, pointed ; spur very slender and longer than the ovary ; leaves 

 linear-lanceolate, tapering ; tubers globose. This lovely Orchis is not 

 infrequent on the chalky soils of various parts of England, growing among 

 grass. Many a fine specimen may be gathered from the cliffs of Dover, 

 while some grow there on spots inaccessible even to the most adventurous 

 footsteps ; but, gleaming among the verdure, are conspicuous afar off in their 

 tint of rich crimson pui-ple— so rich that the artist despairs of imitating it 

 on paper. The stem is from twelve to eighteen inches high, bearing, in 

 July, a short, broadly-conical cluster of crowded flowers, spirally arranged, the 

 spike becoming longer with age. The bulging protuberance of the lip, and 

 the long slender spur, are marked features of this Orchis. The leaves sheathe 

 the stem, about five or six growing from the root. The flowers are some- 

 times white, and in some rare instances double ; and the plant has an odour 

 which to some is pleasing, though we cannot praise it. Douglas Allport, 

 in some verses on this flower, tells of the power of the gathered blossom to 

 recall the scenes amid which it once grew : — 



"Tims, when within my snnless room, 



Heart-sick and worn with Mammon's leaven, 



Thy pyramids of pnrple bloom 



Blush through its loneliness and gloom, 



The spirit bursts its living tomb, 

 And basks beneath the open heaven. 



"There, as on some green knoll reclined, 



The summer landscape round me glowing, 

 While gentle ardours till the mind, 

 I leave the unquiet world behind, 

 And hear a voice in every wind 



Around my fervid temples blowing, 



"Thus, through this woodside plant, the mind 



Sweeps the vast range of things created. 

 And longs, and pants, and i'ails to hud 

 In earth, and ocean, sky, combined. 

 Those joys, unfailing and refined. 



By which its famine may be sated." 



11, Lizard Orchis {0. hircina). — Lip 3-parted, downy; segments 

 narrow, middle one very long and curled like a tendril, lateral ones much 

 shorter ; spur very short. This plant, always very rare on the bushy chalky 

 hills of Kent and Suffolk and Surrey, has not been seen recently by any 

 botanist. It flowers in July, and is described as much resembling a lizard 

 in shape; its calyx green, spotted with purple, its lip purplish-white and 

 spotted at the base, the middle segment more than an inch long, green, and 

 the smell of its flowers as most disgusting and goat-like. 



Most of the species in this genus are remai-kably adapted for cross- 

 fertilization by insects with long tongues, chieHy bees and flies. They 



