126 EPIDENDRUM. 



condition. M. Roezl had pveviously met with the old form on the 

 Cofre de Perote, but the plants sent to Europe (the variety ma jus) 

 were obtained near the Vera Cruz and Mexico railway^ a few leagues 

 from Orizaba, growing upon old and stunted oaks in a district 

 where it rains regularly from one to two hours a day from May to 

 October, and where from December to February dense fogs are 

 common and frosts are by no means rare during the night,* but 

 in the hottest months the temperature ranges from 15° — 21° C. 

 (60° — 70° F.) From that time to the present E. vitellinum majus 

 has been universally recognised as the fin( st Epidendrum of its 

 colour in cultivation ; the original type is now but rarely seen. 



E. Wallisii. 



LuEPiDENDRUM. Stems slender, erect, i — 6 feet high, leafy above, the 

 interuodes spotted with dull purple. Leaves lanceolate, acuminate, 4 — 5 

 inches long. Kacemes 3 — 5 flowered, terminal and from the axils of 

 the uppermost leaves. Flowers about 2 inches across ; sepals and petals 

 oblong-obtuse, canary-yellow, spotted with blackish purple, the petals 

 sometimes with but few spots ; lip large and spreading, broadly obovate 





Epidendrum Wallisii. 



in outline with a deep apical cleft and two lateral smaller ones, the 

 margin notched, white streaked and stained with purple, and having 

 three raised orange lines at the base, of which the middle one is the 

 longest. Column short, thick, pale yellow. 



Epidendrum Wallisii, Echb. in Gard. Chrou. IV. (1875), p. 66 and IX. (1878), p. 

 462. Williams' Orch. Alb. II. t. 74. 



Introduced by us in 1874, through Gustav Wallis, who communicated 

 no locality ; it is now known to inhabit the Frontino district, on the 

 * Belgique horticole, 1883, p. 233, 



