ANSBLLIA. 27 



name of AnseJlia (jujantea. It is this form that is represented by a 

 single flower in plate 4965, fig. 3, of the Botanical Magazine and is 

 named by Sir W. Hooker A. africana, var. natalensis. 



Some years later another Ansellia Avas detected by Speke and Grant during 

 their expedition to the Upper Nile in 1860 — 63 {A. nilotica). And lastly, 

 not long ago an Ansellia was introduced from the Congo by the Compagnie 

 Continental d'Horticulture de Gand {A. congoensis) Thus the genus is 

 shown to lie represented in at least five localities or regions in Africa 

 widely remote from each other, and plants from all of them have 

 been, and probably may be still in cultivation. That these Ansellias 

 are very closely related to each other is so manifest that the ol^served 

 structural differences in their flowers seem 1;)arely sufficient to entitle 

 them to separate specific rank ; but we agree with Mr. N. E. Brown 

 that they cannot at present be accepted as mere varieties of the original 

 type, although admitting the extreme possibility of their being ultimately 

 connected by intermediate forms. 



Ansellia is closely allied to Cymbidium^ from wliicli its very 

 different habit^ its terminal inflorescence, and its bipartite (= four) 

 pollinia chiefly distinguish it. 



Cultural Note. — Ansellia africana and its varieties require the highest 

 temperature available in the orchid houses of Europe ; in other respects 

 the cultural treatment is })recisely the same as that of the Cymbidiums. 



Ansellia africana. 



Stems tufted, 18 — 25 or more inches long, cylindric, as thick as a 



man's thumb, sheathed by the long withered bases of the fallen leaves. 



Leaves from the upper portion of the stem ligulate-lanceolate, acute, 5 — 7 



or more inches long, usually five-nerved. Peduncles terminal, as long 



as the leaves, panicled, many-flowered. Flowers 2 inches in diameter, 



light yellow-green spotted with brown-purple ; sepals narrowly oblong ; 



petals elliptic-oblong, as broad again as the sepals : lip three-lobed, the 



side lobes oblong, erect ; the intermediate lobe ovate, reflexed with two 



keels on the disk and four or five folds in front of them. Column 



elongate, terete above, concave on the face. 



Ansellia africana, Lindl. in Bot. Reg. 1844, sub. t. 12. Bot, Marj, t. 4965.* 

 excl. fig. 3. N. E. Brown in Lindenia, II. sub t. 64. 



A. confusa. 



Stems and leaves longer than in Ansellia africana, the latter also 

 narrower and more acuminate. Flowers smaller with the sepals and 

 petals similar and sub-equal, narrowly oblong, obtuse, light yellow-green 



* The plant here figured seems well-nigh intermediate between the typical Ansellia 

 africana and A. confusa. 



