DENDROBIUM BIGIBBUM. 
[PLaTE 38. | 
Native of Tropical North-east Australia. 
- Epiphytal. Psewdobulbs long, slender, erect, fusiform, one to two feet in length, 
closely invested between the nodes with dry light brown sheaths, the older ones 
swollen at the very base. Leaves oblong-lanceolate, sub-acuminate, five ribbed, of a 
deep green colour, and a somewhat coriaceous texture, a few only (five or six) being 
developed towards the extremities of the stems. Racemes erect or curving, six to 
twelve flowered, nearly a foot in length, usually produced from the upper nodes 
of the old leafless stems, but sometimes from the apex of the younger leafy stems. 
Flowers large, showy, rich rosy purple; sepals oblong acute, flat, of a rich purplish 
magenta, the lateral ones united at the base into a short blunt spur below the 
setting on of the lip, above which spur is a gibbosity, occasioned by a similar swelling 
at the base of the lip (whence comes the specific name bigibbum) ; petals large, 
roundish, spreading, recurved, of the same colour as the sepals ; lip three-lobed, the . 
lateral lobes incurved, the retuse middle lobe somewhat reflexed, rich crimson-purple 
veined with darker purple, the base decurrent and gibbose, and the disk with three 
white papillose crests. Column compressed, grooved, the back united with the sepal. q 
Deyprozium sicispum, Lindley, in Paszton’s Flower Garden, iii, 25, fig. 245; ' 
Hooker, Botanical Magazine, t. 4898; Walpers’ Annales Botanices Systematice, 
Vi, 302; Warner, Select Orchidaceous Plants, 2 ser. t. 8; Van Houtte, Flore 
des Serres, Xi, t. 1143; Bateman, Second Century: of Orchidaceous Plants, t. 169; 
Williams, Orchid Growers’ Manual, 5 ed., 165. - 
This plant belongs to one of the most noble and popular, one of the most 
showy and beautiful genera of the whole family of Orchids, and one among the Howers 
oS | of which nearly every colour occurs—bright yellow, pure white, rich crimson, bright 
Purple, soft mauve, rich orange, nankeen, and many others being found among the 
Many and various habited species of Dendrobes. 
Dendrobium bigibbum, the subject of our plate, is a species 
beautiful and showy character, which, until within the last few years, has been 
Somewhat rare. In 1876, however, we teceived a large ‘consignment from our collector, 
Mr. Goldie, who was then on his way to New Guinea, and who met with it growmg on 
= Jsland in Torres Straits, it having hitherto, we believe, been found only on the 
mainland of Australia. These plants were very fine, some of the specimens being of 
*hormous dimensions, with stems quite two feet long, and from one and a-half to 
two inches in circumference. . The specimens from which our figure of one of the 
most charming forms of this species which we have yet seen, was prepared, were kindly 
“tnt to us from the fine collection of the Marquess of Lothian, at Newhbattle Abbey, 
of a remarkably 
