148 ORCHIDS OF THE CAPE PENINSULA. 
Du Toits’ Kloof which has the sepals and galea tinged with orange. 
This beautiful flower is the object of universal admiration, and the 
name which has been given to it, the ‘‘ Pride of Table Mountain,” 
indicates the honour in which it is held. It is, indeed, the queen of 
terrestrial orchids in the Southern Hemisphere, as Cypripedium spectabile 
may be said to reign, though with less magnificence, in the Northern. 
The first mention hitherto discovered of this plant isin the Historia 
Plantarum of our old English botanist, John Ray, in the third volume 
of which, published in 1704, p. 586, it is enumerated as ‘‘ Orchis 
Africana flore singulari herbaceo, D. Oldenland Mus. Pet. 280,” and, 
after a brief description, Ray adds that he received a dried specimen 
from D. Petiver amongst other rare plants sent by D. Oldenland. 
This, however, was before the time of Linneus. The first botanist to 
describe and publish it under the Linnean binomial system as Disa 
uniflora was Bergius in 1767. Linneus the younger, with the laxer 
notions which prevailed in his day in regard to the law of priority in 
nomenclature, thinking that Bergius’ name was inappropriate (since 
the plant has usually more than one flower), changed the name 
to Disa grandiflora. By the latter name the species has been so long 
and widely known that to revert to the older one will cause incon- 
venience for atime. But Bergius not merely established the species, 
he also founded the genus upon this species, which has always been 
recognised; and, besides, gave an adequate figure, which left no 
sufficient reason for disregarding his name. Botanists are bound to 
admit such a claim, even at the cost of inconvenience. The earliest 
record of the flowering of this plant in Europe appears to have been 
in the Bot. Register for 1825, when it was figured from life. It is 
still abundant on Table Mountain, although of late years large 
quantities of the tubers have been annually exported to Hurope, and 
much needless destruction, arising from wasteful gathering by unskilled 
hands, resulted. But the summit of the mountains being Crown-land, 
the Government has recently intervened, and restricted the removal of 
tubers within reasonable limits; so that, if this supervision be con- 
tinued, there will be little reason to fear the extinction of this truly 
noble species. 
12. Disa ocellata, Bolus, in Journ. Linn. Soc., vol. xx. (1884), 
p. 477.—Glabrous, erect, 6-9 in. high; stem leafy, flexuose ; leaves 
3-4, linear, acute, 14-8 in. long; spike laxly 8-13-flowered, 3-5 in. 
long; bracts leaf-like, acuminate, the lower ones longer than the 
flowers; side sepals oblong, oblique or subfalcate, acute, 5 lines long ; 
odd sepal galeate, acute, with a roundish mouth, 5 lines long, spur 
obtuse and somewhat inflated at the base, 14 lin. long ; petals oblong- 
faleate, the points turned forward, adnate to the column at base; lip 
