i9*>] THE ORCHID REVIEW. 
*37 
ANCISTROCHILUS THOMSONIANUS. 
HIS species is a native of West Tropical Africa, where it was 
W discovered by Mr. W. Kalbreyer when collecting for Messrs. James 
Veitch and Sons, Chelsea, and was described by Reichenbach in 1879, under 
the name Pachystoma Thomsoniana ( Gard . Chron., 1879, ii. p. 582), being 
dedicated at Kalbreyer’s request to “ the late Rev. George Thompson, who 
was unusually kind-hearted in his English reception of the German traveller.” 
Reichenbach described it as perhaps the most curious discovery made in 
Tropical Africa by Kalbreyer, regarded from a geographical point of view 
as all the Pachystomas known were of Asiatic origin, and he remarked: 
“ The large green, white and purple flowers, with a certain Phalaenopsis 
shape, recommend the plant.” It was figured in the Botanical Magazine 
(t. 6471), when Sir Joseph Hooker expressed his doubts whether it really 
belonged to Pachystoma, though he was unable to find a better place for it 
among described genera. However, Sir Joseph stated that “its graceful 
form and the purity and brilliancy of its white, and the vividness of its 
purple, render if one of the most beautiful Orchids of its type and habit, 
which remind one of some Ccelogynes.” 
