CYPRIPEDIUM CGENANTHUM SUPERBUM. 
’ [Puate 420.] 
Garden Hybrid. 
Terrestrial. Stemless. Leaves distichous, ligulate, and deep green, faintly 
tesselated. Scape erect, clothed with a tomentum of dark purplish hairs, and 
bearing a single large and highly-coloured flower on the apex. Dorsal sepal deep 
vinous red at the base, and in the centre, through which rum numerous spotted 
lines of rosy purple, the margins and upper portion passing into bright purplish 
_ Mauve, the outer margin white; lower sepal greenish white, spotted on the veins 
with blackish purple; petals deep yellowish brown, darkest on the upper half; Lip 
large, broadly obtuse, rich deep port-wine colour on the exterior, yellowish within, 
freely dotted with reddish purple. Its parents are Cypripedium Harrisianum and 
. insigne Maulei.. 
CYPRIPEDIUM GNANTHUM suPERBUM, Veitch’s Catalogue, 1885, p. 11; Reichen- 
bachia, First Series, i, t. 38; Lindenia, i., t., 33; Revue de Horticulture Belge, 
1885, p. 233; Veitch’s Manual of Orchidaceous Plants, iv., p. 94, with woodcut. 
The present beautiful plant is a Veitchian hybrid, of great beauty and 
richness of colouring. When speaking of Cypripedium enanthum in the last 
volume, p. 379, we remarked that were we confined to grow one form of these Slipper 
Orchids, it would be this variety, on account of its freedom in flowering, and its 
bright and cheerful appearance ; this variety only intensifies that feeling, for we cannot 
but feel that this plant is one of the very handsomest of the genus. There 
would appear to be several varieties of C. @nanthum, such as Orestes, Electra, 
Acis, and others, some of which are only supposed to be of this parentage, but 
the prevailing colours and markings prove them to be all from the same stock. 
At the present moment we say, without fear of contradiction, that no brighter and 
richer colours have yet been obtained than from the two parents of the present 
plant, C. Harrisianum and C. insigne Maulei. For the privilege of producing a 
figure of this superb variety, we are indebted to the kindness of R. H. Measures, 
Esq., of The Woodlands, Streatham, who has one of the most superb and complete 
collections of Cypripedes. in this country. The plants are exceedingly well grown 
_ by his gardener, Mr. Abrahams, who appears to be nearly or quite as’ great an 
enthusiast for these Slipper Orchids as does Mr. Measures himself. 
Cypripedium ananthum superbum is an extremely handsome variety, presenting 
all the beauties of the original C. c@nanthum, with the colours deepened, 
brightened, and intensified. The flowers, too, are larger, and the upper sepal is 
far more richly coloured, the intense deep vinous purple pervading the whole surface, 
