LYCASTE COSTATA. 
[PLATE 384.] 
Native of the United States of Colombia. 
Terrestrial. Pseudobulbs some three inches or more high, oblong-ovate, obtuse, 
slightly compressed at the sides, smooth when young, becoming furrowed with age, 
deep green. Leaves from a foot to eighteen inches long, ovate-lanceolate, acuminate, 
plicate, and ribbed, petiolate, and rich deep green. Pedunele erect, single-flowered, 
furnished with numerous large, ovate, acute, sheathing bracts. Upper sepal ovate- 
lanceolate, incurved; Jateral sepals somewhat faleate, deflexed; petals shorter and 
narrower than the sepals, projecting forward over the column, all yellowish white, 
which becomés tinged with pale green towards the edges; lip three-lobed, lateral 
lobes erect, oblong-acute; anterior lobe broadly oblong, apiculate, deeply fringed at 
the sides near the base, white, bearing on the disc an elevated fleshy callus, in 
front of which is a faint stain of yellow. 
Lycaste costaTa, Lindley, Botanical Register, xxix., misc., p. 15; Gartenflora, 
t. 620. 
This is a useful and free-blooming species, and one that is in much request 
for decorative purposes. It produces quite a number of flowers from each bulb, 
and is well adapted for cutting, as the blooms last a long time in perfection when 
arranged with other flowers in water, or in wet sand in a glass or vase upon the 
table, and at night they yield a delicious perfume. In the daytime, however, the — 
flowers are quite devoid of fragrance; this is a curious fact, which occurs with 
many Orchid flowers, whilst numbers of them yield a distinct perfume at different 
times during the twenty-four hours. Several consignments of these plants have 
arrived in this country from Colombia, having been sent by collectors for a species 
of Anguloa, which the plant. much resembles when not in flower. As a species it 
- would appear to be nearly allied to Lycaste lanipes or L. Barringtonie, from either of 
which, however, it is quite distinct. The sepals and petals are Jarger and broader, 
and it produces its flowers in the winter months, when choice flowers of all kinds, 
but especially white kinds, are in great request; moreover, they help to enliven 
the plant howses at a dull season, and when frost and snow prevail in the open 
air. This species, when in flower, may be taken into a warm conservatory or the 
dwelling-house, where it may be kept without any ill effects arising, if protected 
from cold draughts; indeed, nearly all the plants belonging to this genus may be 
so utilised, for proof of which see note by Mr. Skinner upon the treatment of 
L. Skinneri, recorded in The Orchid-Grower's Manual, 6 ed., p. 52. The plate 
now before us was prepared from a specimen growing in our own collection in the 
Victoria and Paradise Nurseries, 
