44 MASDEVALLIA. 



Introduced by us, in 1874, from the Frontino district in New 

 Granada, through Gustav WaUis. Its nearest allies are Masdevallia 

 elephonticep.^ and M. Mooreana, from the latter of which it is not 

 distiug'uishable in a dried state. When first expanded the flower 

 emits a strong fetid odour. The specific name is that of one of 

 the heroes in Rabelais' once famous story of Gargantua and 

 Pantagruel. 



M. Gaskelliana. 



Leaves linear-lanceolate, acute, 3 — 4 inches long. Peduncles slender, 

 mottled dull purple and green, one-flowered. Flowers triangular, about 

 an inch across vertically, with a very short campanulate perianth tube ; 

 free portion of sepals triangular, with short hispid pubescence on the 

 inner side, keeled behind, the upper one cream-white spotted with red, 

 the lateral two similarly coloured but with the spots aggregated chiefly 

 on the outer half of each; sepaline tails 1^ — 2 inches long, pale red- 

 brown ; petals ligulate, reflexed at the apex, where there is a brown 

 hairy wart ; lip narrowly saccate, with three longitudinal keels within 

 the cavity, pale yellow. Column pale yellow, bent at the apex. 

 Masdevallia Gaskelliana, Rchb. in Gard. Chron. XX. (1883), p. 294. 



Imported in 1882 by Messrs. Sander and Co., origin not recorded. 

 It flowered for the first time in this country in the collection of 

 Mr. Holbrook Gaskell, at Woolton Wood, near Liverpool, to whom 

 it is dedicated. Its nearest affinity is Masdevallia astuta, with 

 which the flowers are almost structurally identical but smaller in all 

 their parts ; it differs from that species chiefly in its much smaller 

 leaves and one-flowered (?) peduncles. 



M. gemmata. 



A dimiiuitive plant. Leaves linear, 1| — 2 inches long, somewhat 

 fleshy, grooved on the upper side. Peduncles flliform, decumbent, 

 longer than the leaves, one-flowered. Upper sepal nearly free, triangular 

 at the base, brownish yellow with pur[)le veiuo, contracted into an 

 orange-yellow filiform tail an inch long ; lateral two larger, connate 

 into an oblong, concave, somewhat boat-shaped body, vinous purple 

 witli deeper veins and with an orange-yellow tail inserted in each 

 outer margin near the apex ; petals and lip very minute, the former 

 linear-oblong, obscurely toothed at the apex, the latter cordate- 

 triangular, purple. 



Masdevallia gemmata, Rchb. in Gurd. Chron. XX. (1883), p. 294. M. Trichaite, 

 Echb. in Gard. Chron. XX. (1883), p. 360. 



A recently introduced species of the Triaristellj; section, whose 



