RENANTHERA ROHANIANA. 
[Puate 435.] 
Native of Borneo. 
Epiphytal. Stem stout, ascending, furnished with numerous lorate obtuse leaves, 
which are firm and leathery in texture, and rich deep green. Spike axillary, simple, 
pendulous, hispid, many-flowered. Flowers dimorphous, the four basilar ones more 
thick and fleshy, with a ground colour of rich orange-yellow, freely and thickly 
spotted with blackish purple, the ordinary flowers some two-and-a-half to three inches 
in diameter; the sepals and petals nearly equal, lanceolate, undulated on the edges, 
acute, ground colour white, freely blotched with large marks of dark blood colour ; 
lip three-lobed, saccate, fleshy, the side lobes somewhat quadrilateral, middle lobe 
tripartite, crest turned backwards. Spur entirely wanting. 
RENANTHERA RowAntana, Reichb. fil, Xenia Orchidacea, 1854, i., p. 89; 
Revue Horticole de France, 1879, p- 210, with coloured plate. 
The plant here depicted is by no means a new discovery, it having flowered 
for the first time in Europe in the gardens of the Prince Camille de Rohan, at Sichrow, 
in Bohemia, nearly forty years ago, and to whom it is dedicated; it is, however, one 
of the rarest species in cultivation, and at the same time one of the very 
handsomest species which we have in our collections. It is closely related to the 
plant named Vanda Lowii, by Lindley, which has been removed to Renanthera by 
Reichenbach, and more recently by Bentham to the genus Arachnanthe, but as this 
latter genus is a synonym of Renanthera we cannot do better, we think, than 
conform to the name under which the German Professor originally described it. 
The present plant, like Renanthera Lowii and its varieties, is remarkable for a curious 
dimorphism of its flowers, as will be seen by a glance at our plate. Two kinds 
of flowers are always developed upon the same inflorescence, and this curious feature 
does not appear to be accidental, as it is of constant occurrence, neither does it 
appear to be functional, for the two kinds of flowers have been proved to be equally 
perfect, and there is no sexular difference. The mystery therefore remains; perhaps 
it can only be solved in its native forests. As before remarked, its nearest ally is 
Rk. Lowii, from which it would appear to differ in having shorter leaves, in 
flowering before attaining the size and age of that species, and in having four 
basilar flowers differing both in shape and colour from the other blooms upon the 
same raceme; whilst in R. Lowii two of these altered flowers would seem to be 
the usual number. 
