HNENGR Son 
à 
161 
ON HABENARIA MIERSIANA, Champ. 
By H. F. Hawcz, PH.D ero: 
This Orchid, one of the rarest members of the Hongkong flora, was 
first deseribed by its discoverer, the late Lieut.-Colonel Champion, in 
1855,* the determination being supervised by Professor Lindley, who 
pointed out a close affinity with the Nepalese M. geniculata, Don. 
Mr. Bentham admitted the species in his * Flora Hongkongensis,' 
with some slight modification of the character, but without any special 
remark. Thunberg, in 1784,T described an Orchid from the neigh- 
bourhood of Nagasaki, which he erroneously took for O. Susanne, L. 
Ten years later, however, having in the interval discovered his mistake, 
he gave a figure of the plant, f under the name of O. radiata, adducing 
his former name as a synonym. Lindley, in his monograph of the 
family, placed this in the genus Platanthera,§ no doubt on account of 
its supposed relationship to P. Susanne, for he had seen no specimen, 
and his diagnosis was simply framed from Thunberg's description. 
As regards that author's figure, the flower is a very good representa- 
tion of that of Habenaria Miersiana, but there are only two in the raceme, 
and the leaves are depicted much narrower and more acute than in the 
Chinese plant. 
Amongst Maximowicz’s Nagasaki plants is an Orchid distributed 
by him under Lindley's name, whic find on a careful comparison 
and dissection of the flower, to be in all respects identical with Cham- 
pion's species, the fleshy processes of the stigma, characteristic of 
typical Habenarie, but not occurring in Platanthere, being equally 
conspicuous. It was not until after I had ascertained this fact, that I 
became aware that the same plant had been previously gathered in 
Japan by Buerger and Siebold, the latter of whom also considered it 
as the one described by Thunberg; whilst Professor Miquel, on ac- 
count of its having broader leaves and less deeply-cut lateral labellum- 
lobes than represented in the plate, characterized it as a new species, 
under the name of ZZ. Sieboldiana,| very acutely remarking: “ Prze- 
sertim confinis videtur H. Miersiane, Champ., eujus autem lobi labelli 
laciniati.? This, which is certainly an imaginary, is doubtless also a 
ook. Journ. Bot 37. + Flor. Jap. 2. 
*H 
1 Ic. Plant. Jap. leo. Y t 2. § Gen. et n ‘Orchid. 296. 
l| Ann. Mus. Lugd.-Bat. ii. 208. 
