io8 NATIVE BRITISH ORCHIDACE.E 



Genus VIII MALAXIS Swartz 



Column minute. Anther at back of column, pollinia four, in superincumbent pairs. 

 Stigma on face of column, rostellum a small viscid mass at its apex. 



Small herbs in Britain mostly growing in Sphagnum with two pseudo-bulbs one 

 above the other, with small leaves sometimes fringed with adventive buds, and 

 very small green flowers with lip pointing upwards. 



Only our species in Europe. Closely allied to Uparis and Microstylis. In the 

 Orchids of the United States and Canada (Oakes Ames, 1924) the last-named genus is 

 included in Malaxis. 



I. Malaxis paludosa Solander ap. Swartz 

 PI. 18 B (p. loi); PL E, fig. I. Bog Orchid 



Rhizome short, connecting the two pseudo-bulbs, which are ovate, somewhat four- 

 sided, the new bulb embraced by the leaves, 1-2 cm. above the old, which is as large 

 as a pea, clothed with brownish acute scales, and tapering below into a slender root 

 (PI. E, fig. i). Stem erect, 6-12 cm. tall, 3-5 -angled above, hke the whole plant 

 glabrous." Leaves 3-4 (often only two fully developed, the lowest one or two reduced 

 to sheaths), small, short, concave, spoon-Uke, ovate or oblong, sub-obtuse or sub- 

 acute, rather tliick, 3-7-nerved, pale yellow-green, fringed near the tip (as also some- 

 times the sheaths) with little gland-like bulbils capable of producing new plants. The 

 new pseudo-bulb is produced in the axil of the uppermost leaf. Raceme slender, spike- 

 hke, many-flowered, rather dense, later becoming lax. Flowers very small, yellow- 

 green, inconspicuous, lip pointing upwards. Bracts small, lanceolate acute, longer 

 than the twisted stalk of the small top-shaped untwisted ovary, scarcely longer than 

 its stalk. Lateral sepals erect, ovate or broadly lanceolate, somewhat triangular, 

 obtuse, I -nerved, tips recurved, median pointing downwards, slightly longer and 

 broader, obtuse. Petals two, Hnear-lanceolate, i -nerved, narrower and shorter, 

 spreading, with tips curved back. Lip erect, longer than petals, but shorter, firmer, 

 and sometimes darker than the sepals, undivided, ovate, sub-obtuse, with a (some- 

 times bifid) little point, concave, 3 -nerved, embracing the column. Column minute, 

 with a green obtuse membranous lobe, concave within, on each side at the apex, 

 forming a clinandrium to shelter the pollinia, maldng the column appear toothed 

 at apex. Anther, seen from behind in the bud, heart-shaped, obtuse, united to 

 column by its broad base; in the open flower shrivelled downwards into a shallow 

 wrinkled mass in wliich the broad ends of the otherwise free pollinia rest as in a 



