ONCIDIUM PHYMATOCHILUM. 
[Puate 470.] 
Native of Brazil. 
Epiphytal. Pseudobulbs broadly fusiform, somewhat compressed, about five inches 
long, of a ferrugineous hue, clothed at the base with several large sheathing scales, 
and bearing upon the apex a single large leaf, which is obovate, lanceolate, about a 
foot in length, and some three inches in breadth, striated on the upper side, strongly 
veined beneath. Scape erect, rising from the base of the pseudobulb, paniculate and 
many-flowered. Sepals and petals nearly equal, slightly twisted, linear acuminate, 
greenish yellow, spotted and dotted with deep orange-red, dull brown on the reverse 
side; ip shorter than the sepals, trowel-shaped, the side lobes small, forming rounded 
ear-like protuberances, the front lobe white, with a reflexed acuminate point, crest 
triangular, bearing many teeth, tubercles yellow, dotted with orange. 
-ONCIDIUM PHYMATOCHILUM, Inndley, Gardeners’ Chronicle, 1848, p. 139. 
Pazxton’s Flower Garden, p. 78, % 18. Inndley, Folia Orchidacea, 191, p. 54. 
£ escatorea, t. 35. Botanical Magazine, t. 5214. Flore des Serres, xxiii., t. 2465. 
Wilhams’ Orchid Grower's Manual, 6th edition, p. 498. 7 
The plant here figured belongs to a family which exists in large numbers 
throughout the length and breadth of Tropical America, as well as in the 
West Indian Islands, many of the kinds growing in the mountain regions, often at 
great elevations, along with their near relatives the Odontoglossums. The species 
which we now have under consideration was for a long time supposed to be a 
native of some part of Mexico, and the certainty of its habitat was not cleared up 
until M. Linden, of Brussels, figured it in his Pescatorea from a plant that had 
been collected in the neighbourhood of Nova Friburgo, in Brazil, by M. Pinel, and 
thus set at rest the dispute. It is a very elegant and distinct kind, and the 
present figure was drawn by Miss G. Hamilton from a plant which flowered in 
the spring of the present year in the Victoria and Paradise Nurseries, and it well 
represents the species. | 
Oncidium phymatochilum is an evergreen plant of a very distinct character. It 
is not a new species, for it was known in our gardens about fifty years ago, but 
the. early collectors failed to notify the spot where it had been collected. It has 
somewhat compressed pseudobulbs, which bear upon their apex a single leathery leaf, 
which is a foot or more in length, and three inches in breadth. The scape is erect, 
arching, several feet in length, paniculate, and the flowers are numerous, the sepals 
and petals being nearly equal, linear, reflexed, pale greenish yellow, spotted on the 
face with deep orange-red. The lip is white, spotted with red, and having at the 
