NEOTT/E^— EPIPACTIS 59 



3. Rootstock long, vertical, knotted; roots thickening downwards. Stems clustered. 



Leaves small, often tinged violet. Flowers large, greenish white; bracts long; 

 ovary rough with short hairs. Shady woods. E. violacea 



4. Rootstock short; roots long, slender, many. Stem (in Britain) short, stumpy. 



Leaves short, stiff, in two opposite ranks; bracts short. Ovary hairy; flowers 

 rather small, wine-red; lip with tubercled sometimes toothed hunches. Rocky 

 ground on limestone. E. rubiginosa 



B. RosteUum none, or only visible in newly opened flowers, quicldy vanishing. 



5. Rootstock vertical with many fleshy roots. Stems 1-5. Leaves ovate, flat, inter- 



nodes short. Raceme long, graceful. Flowers rather large, wide open, yellowish 

 green; sepals and petals long, pointed; lip long, narrow, pointed, tip not 

 reflexed. Woodland plant. E. leptochila 



6. Rhi2ome short. Roots few, hard, wiry, deeply buried. Leaves oblong, folded, 



stiff. Flowers small, yellow-green, few, in a short raceme; sepals and petals 

 connivent, short, broad; forepart of lip cordate, triangular, as broad as long, 

 tip recurved. Plant of sandy dunes. E. dunensis 



The section Arthrochilium forms a natural connecting link with the previous genus, 

 Cephalantbera, with which it shares the following peculiarities. The flowers are less 

 open and more conspicuously coloured than in Eu-epipactis, the lip is jointed, the 

 basal cup has an ear on each side, and the epichile is crenate with a yellow ridged 

 plate at the base, like the crests of Cephalantbera. The American E. gigantea belongs 

 to this section. 



Epipactis Adanson, Tarn, n, 70 (1763). R. Brown in Ait. Hort. Kew. ed. 2, v, 

 201 (1813). HELLEBORiNEDruce(i909). Amesia Nelson and Macbride (1913). 



In Epipactis the generic characters are so striking that they quite eclipse the much 

 less conspicuous characters which distinguish the various species from each other. 

 This dominant family likeness makes the specific differences seem insignificant by 

 comparison. Similarly the conspicuous generic characters of the genus Ophrys 

 appeared to Linnseus to so far outweigh the specific characters, that the latter appeared 

 to be only of varietal value, and all the forms known to him were included in one 

 species — Ophrys insectifera L. 



Fertilisation. Within the single genus Epipactis the whole range of development 

 from total self-fertilisation to entire dependence on insects for pollination is exhibited. 

 It presents an epitome of the evolution of a flower from self-fertilisation to cross- 

 pollination, including some intermediate methods, i.e. 



(i) Total self-fertilisation, E. Muelkri Godf. (non-British). 



8-2 



