48 MASDEVALLIA. 



gibbosity below at the base, yellowish white ; free portion of upper 

 sepal triangular-rotund, concave, yellowish white like the tube, the 

 lateral two oblong-rotund, connate to below the middle, keeled at the 

 suture, the outer half yellowish white, inner half pale violet-purple ; 

 tails spreading, Ih — 2 inches long, pale yellow; petals linear-oblong, 

 toothed at the apex, white ; lip oblong, reflexed at the spotted red- 

 brown apex. 



Masdevallia infracta, Lindl. Gen. et Sp. Orch. p. 193 (1831). Belg. hort. 1873, 



p. 35. Van Houtte's F/. des Serres XXIII. t. 2889. ]\I. longicaudata, Lemaire in 



Ilhis. hort. 1868, p. 109, icon. xyl. 



var.— purpurea. 



Flowers somewhat larger and of a nearly uniform violet-purple. 

 M. infracta purpurea, Rclib. in Gard. C'hron. XX. (1883), p. 460. 

 A Brazilian species discovered in the early part of the present 

 century by the Frencli traveller and naturalist^ J^escourtilz, on the 

 wooded mountains which separate Rio de Janeiro from the Campos. 

 It was gathered by Gardner on the Organ Mountains in 188 7^ 

 and sent by hiui to Messrs. Loddiges, in whose nursery at Hackney 

 it flowered for the first time in this country in the following 

 year. In a geographical sense, Masdevallia infracta is a remotely 

 outlying member of the genus^ its nearest ally^ so far as at present 

 known, being an inhabitant of the Peruvian Andes, upwards of 

 2,000 miles distant. The glossy, shining surface of the leaves is a 

 marked feature in this species. Of the two known forms, which are 

 simply colour variations, the ]nirple one is the more showy. The 

 applicability of the name infracta, " unbroken,^' is obscure, 



M. lonocharis. 



A dwarf, tufted plant. Leaves elliptic-lanceolate, 3—4 inches long, 

 including the foot-stalk. Scapes numerous, slender, as long as the leaves, 

 bearing a solitary flower half an inch in diameter, and with a com- 

 pressed tubular bract below the ovary. Perianth tube campanulate, 

 yellowish ; the sepals keeled at the back, the free portions very 

 short, rotund, white blotched with violet-purple ; tails slender, spreading, 

 about as long as the tube, yellow ; petals and lip minute, the former 

 oblong, auricl'id at the base, the latter clawed, tongue-shaped, apiculate, 

 purplish. 



Masdevallia lonocharis, IJchb. in Gard. Chron. IV. (1875), p. 388. Bot. Mag. 

 t. 6262. 



A pretty free-flowering species introduced by us in 1874, from 

 Pern, through our collector, Walter Davis, who discovered it in the 

 Andean valley of Sandia, in the province of Caravaya, at 9,000 — 



