THE ORCHID REVIEW. [St 
r, 1921. 
DENDROBIUM CYMBIDIOIDES AND D. TRIFLORUM. 
71 FINE plant of Dendrobium Cymbidioides that has recently been in 
Tl flower with Messrs. Sanders recalls the fact that there are two allied 1 
plants in cultivation under the same name. They belong to the section | 
Sarcopodium, which is characterised by having diphyllous pseudo-bulbs. 
D. Cymbidioides appeared in cultivation about fifty years ago, and was 1 
figured in the Botanical Magazine (t. 4755), when its history was given as J 
follows :—“ A plant very little known, either in our gardens or herbaria, of I 
which we received living specimens from Messrs. Rollison, of the Tooting j 
Nursery, without any name. It proves to be the Desmotrichum Cym- j 
bidioides of Blume, native of the lofty wooded mountains of Gede and I 
Salak in Java, a genus of that author of which all the species have, we j 
think with propriety, by Dr. Lindley, been incorporated with or restored to j 
Dendrobium. Dr. Lindley had indeed seen no specimens ; but drawings of | 
this were sent to him by Professor Reinwardt, and of closely allied species, j 
Desmotrichum triflorum, * scarcely differing from this, but in its uniformly J 
tetragonal pseudo-bulbs and cream-coloured flowers always appearing in I 
threes. A figure of the species also appears in Miquel’s Choix des Plantes. 1 
D. triflorum has remained an almost unknown species down to the I 
present time, but on comparing the plants sent to Kew by Sir Fred. 
Moore, Mr. Rolfe found that one of them agreed with the drawing sent by 
Reinwardt to Lindley, except as to the number of flowers, and also that it j 
is the D. Cymbidioides of most gardens, having been twice figured as such J* 
(Gard. Citron., 1896, i. p. 581, fig. 90; and Cog*. Diet. Orch., Dendrob., I 
t. 17), and that it had been in cultivation since at least 1889, when it j 
flowered both with Mr. Moore and with M. Van Imshoot, at Ghent. The I 
latter stated that he had received it from Mr. Witte, of Leyden, under the 
name of “ Ccelogynq. ocellata var., Java,” but whether this represents its | 
original introduction is, of course, uncertain". 
The differences between the two plants are very marked. D. Cym¬ 
bidioides has short elliptical leaves, greenish yellow sepals and petals, and 
the lip nearly white, with about four dull purple stripes on the side lobes, 
and the front lobe broadly ovate, with a bright yellow area at its base and 
in front of the crest. D. triflorum has oblong, much longer and narrower 
leaves, much narrower straw yellow sepals and petals, the side lobes of the 
lip almost wholly dull purple, and the front lobe much longer and narrower. 
The crests are also quite different in the two plants. They are both 
handsome species, with very little of the appearance of Dendrobium. The 
flowers resemble those of a Cymbidium, hence the specific name 
Cymbidioides. D. triflorum is not so well named, for the flowers on a 
