12 



PHAIUS. 



in 1824. Over so extensive a region the plant is observed to vary 

 somewhat in habit and the flowers considerably in colour; it has 

 received many names in consequence. The form known as Phaius 

 Blumei, first detected on Mount Salak^ in Java, by the botanist 

 whose name it bears, is now regarded as a variety of the common 

 type, from which it differs only in the character described above. 

 P. grandifolius was introduced to Jamaica by Hinton East in 1787, 

 where it has become thoroughly naturalised, and is now found growing 

 freely in the bush, and sometimes even in the forest, on the hills 

 at 2,000 — 4,000 feet elevation.* P. grandifolius is one of those 

 useful orchids that may be cultivated in any ordinary stove or 

 intermediate house, and when in flower it may even be used for 

 the decoration of apartments from which frost is carefully excluded. 

 Its flowering season is from February to April. 



P. Humblotii. 



Pseudo-bulbs sub-globose, about \^ inches in diameter, with 2 — 3 



rings where the leaves have fallen. Leaves broadly lanceolate, 



acuminate, plicate, 15 — 20 or more inches long, narrowed below into 



channelled and winged foot-stalks. Scapes as long as, or longer 



than, the leaves, racemose, 7 — 10 or more flowered. Flowers 2 inches 



in diameter; sepals and petals similar and sub-equal, broadly obovate- 



elliptic, light rose-purple suffused with white ; lip broadly pandurif orm 



with crisped and undulate margin, the basal lobes notched at the edge, 



reddish brown passing into crimson at the margin ; the anterior lobe 



rose-purple with a whitish centre, on which are two large bright yellow 



teeth jjointing inwards. Column slender, bent like a swan's neck, 



terete and greenish above, grooved below the smaU stigmatic cavity. 



Phaius Humblotii, Rchb. in Gard. Chron. XIV. (1880), p. 812. Id. XXVI. 

 (1886), p. 294. Id. 173 icon. xyl. Sander's Eeichenhachia, I. t. 17. 



Introduced by M. Leon Humblot, a French naturalist and traveller, 

 who had discovered it during an excursion into the interior of 

 Madagascar, in 1879 — 80. He sent at the same time the beautiful 

 Phaius tuberculosus, so that to M. Humblot is due the merit of 

 adding to the orchid collections of Europe two of the most remark- 

 able species of the genus yet known. 



P. maculatus. 



Pseudo-bulbs clustered, ovoid, 4 — 5 inches long, and 2 — 2| inches 



thick, produced at the apex into a leafy stem 15 — 20 inches long, 



* D, Morris in Gard. Cliron. XXIV. (1885), p. 140. We have since had it offered to us 

 by an amateur collector of orchids in Jamaica. 



