MASDEVALLIA. 65 



A morphological peculiarity in Masdevdiha tovarensis and also in 

 the allied species M. Ep]ri2Jpmm, M. infrada, and M. macnJafa, that 

 was omitted when drawing up the sub-sectional characters of the 

 Polyanthoi Masdevallias, may properly be noticed here. The so-called 

 peduncles or scapes of all these species are sharply three-angled, and 

 the flowers are produced from their apex, the pedicels issuing from 

 a membraneous, persistent sheath that is single in M. Ephipphnn and 

 M. infrada, but double in M. maculata and M. tovarensis. When 

 the flowers fade the pedicels and ovaries wither and drop with them 

 if infertilised, which is usually the case, but the long, trigonal part 

 does not wither and drop like the flower scapes of most Masdevallias; 

 it continues green and fresh, and if not removed from the plant, 

 more flowers are produced from the apex in the following year 

 precisely in the same way as on the first occasion ; the same occurrence 

 has been observed in the third season, so that it may be assumed, 

 in default of direct observation, that so long as the leaf, from the 

 base of Avhich the so-called scape springs, is in a condition to perform 

 its functions, so long will the flowers be produced from the apex 

 of these trigonal scapes on the return of the flowering season. This 

 circumstance shows that there is a material difference between the 

 slender, terete scapes of those Masdevallias that perish when the flowers 

 drop and the more robust, three-angled ones of the species in question, 

 that persist and produce flowers from their apex two, three, or more 

 seasons in succession. The latter are, in fact, bi-, tri-, and even 

 perennial leafless stems, and not scapes in the strict botanical meaning 

 of the term, such as is implied in the foregoing descriptions. It is 

 highly probable, too, that this peculiarity is not confined to the species 

 named above, but in the absence of direct observation we are unable 

 to specify any others by name. 



M. triangularis. 



Leaves elliptic-oblong, 4 — 6 inches long, narroAved below into a some- 

 what slender petiole as long as the blade. Scapes slender, as long as 

 the leaves, with a small, keeled, acute, spotted bract at the base of the 

 ovary, one-flowered. Perianth tube broadly campanulate ; sepals tri- 

 angular-oblong, concave, keeled at the back, the lateral two sub-falcate, 

 tawny yellow, densely spotted with purple; tails filiform, 2| — 3 inches 

 long, brownish purple ; petals oblong, tridentate at the tip, white ; lip 

 oblong, dilated at the middle and reflexed at the apex, at which there 

 is a small tuft of blackish hairs, white, spotted with red-purple below. 

 Masdevallia triangularis, Lindl. Oreh. Lind. p. 5 (1846). Rchb. in Bonpl. II. p. 23 



(1854). Id. in Gard. Chron. XVII. (1882), p. 44. 



One of the prettiest of the Caiidata- sub-section that was first dis- 

 covered by Linden, in 1842 — 3, near Merida, in Venezuela, and re- 

 P 



