48 CYPRIPEDIDM. 



hands for propagation, and subsequently we acquired the remainder; 

 the species in the meantime had been named by Professor Reichenbach 

 in compliment to the introducer. Not long afterwards its habitat 

 was discovered in Assam it is said, by the collectors of Messrs. Low 

 and Co. and of Messrs. Sander and Co., and a considerable number 

 of plants was received by both firms from India ; the habitat is 

 thence known, but the precise locality has not yet been divulged.* 

 The flowering season of Cypripedium Spicerianum lasts from the 

 beginning of November till Christmas. It is somewhat variable 

 in colour, chiefly in the upper sepal, and several sub-varieties 

 have been designated by name, but none such have yet come under 

 our notice sufficiently distinct to merit separate description. 



C. Stonei. 



Leaves strap-shaped, 12 — 15 inches long, very leathery, almost fleshy, 



grass-green. Scapes 18 — 24 inches long, dull greenish purple, pubescent 



below the inflorescence, but with only a few scattered hairs along the 



3 — 5 flowered rachis. Bracts lanceolate, acuminate, sheathing the almost 



glabrous ovaries to ^ — \ their length. Flowers about 4 inches across 



vertically ; upper sepal cordate, acuminate, white, usually with 2 — 3 



or more blackish crimson longitudinal streaks, keeled behind ; lower 



sepal similar and nearly ecmal to it ; petals linear, 5 — 6 inches long, 



pendent, twisted, with a few black ciliate hairs on each margin 



towards the base, pale tawny yellow to two-thirds of their length, 



spotted with brownish crimson, the apical third wholly brownish 



crimson ; lip projecting, calceiform, dull rose colour, veined and 



reticulated with crimson, whitish beneath, the infolded lobes narrow, 



whitish. Staminode oval-oblong, yellowish white, fringed, except on the 



front side, with close-set bristly hairs. 



Cypripedium Stonei, Hort. Low fide Hook, in Bot. Mag. t. 5349 (1862). Tlhis. 

 hori. X. (1863), t. 355. Van Houtte's Fl. des Scrres, XVII. t. 1792—93. Jennings' 

 Orch. t. 12. Williams' Orch. Alb. I. t. 8. 



var. — platy taenium. 



Flowers much larger in all their parts and more richly coloured ; 



sepals broader, with broader streaks ; petals nearly an inch broad at 



the widest, yellowish white at the base, densely spotted with reddish 



crimson from about an inch from the base, the spots becoming 



confluent towards and at the tips. 



C. Stonei platytajnium, Rchb. in Gard. Chron. 1867, p. 1118, icon. xyl. Id. 

 Xen. Orch. II. p. 153, t. 161. Warner's Sel. Orch. III. t. 14. Fl. Mag. n. s. t. 414. 



* " The interests of science are unfortunately sacrificed to the desire of. the sole possessor of 

 any useful information regarding the origin and native country (of a new orchid) that these 

 should be withheld from the public." — Botanical Magazine, sub. t. 6037. 



