162 THE ORCHID REVIEW. [Juty-Aucust, 1918. 
. is 2 =e 
2a THE BRITISH MARSH ORCHISES. Ee 
ARLY in June last we received from Mr. T. A. Dymes, F.L.S., West 
Drayton, Middlesex, living plants of two Orchises that he had found 
in a marshy meadow there, and he mentioned also finding a natural hybrid 
between them. The plants sent were immediately recognised as O, latifolia 
and O. incarnata, the two species recorded by the late Mr. C. B. Clarke, 
F.R.S., over a quarter of a century ago, as plentiful in the marshes of the 
River Test, in Hampshire. They are also recorded by Babington as found 
in peat holes at Triplow, Cambridgeshire. The Hampshire locality is 
Bransbury Marsh, where also O. maculata occurs, and examples of all three 
species from Mr. Clarke are preserved at Kew. The existence of natural 
hybrids at Bransbury has long been suspected, but Mr. Clarke was always 
sceptical on the point, and no opportunity presented itself to the writer of 
investigating the question on the spot. But the Middlesex locality is mote 
accessible, and we gladly accepted Mr. Dymes’ invitation to visit the spot 
with him on June 16th, the result being that we found both the species and 
the natural hybrid above mentioned. 
The locality is a typical swamp, with sedges, Myosotis palustris, 
Veronica Beccabunga, and other marsh plants in the wetter parts, and the 
soil black and spongy. The Orchises grow for the most part among grass 
bordering the more swampy parts, where the soil is saturated with vai 
O. latifolia was quite common, many plants being frequently present In @ 
few square yards of ground. This is the plant known as the Broad-leaved 
Marsh Orchis, the leaves being unspotted and the flowers dark purple. 
O. incarnata, has flesh-pink flowers, and narrower, unspotted leaves, and 
was far less common, being found here and there, with occasionally two # 
three plants together. Mr. Dymes, however, remarked that 4 fortnight 
earlier it was three or four times as common, for it commences to bloom 
least ten days earlier than O. latifolia, and is also somewhat dwarler, # 
that by this time some of the flowers were over, and the plants aie | 
concealed by the surrounding herbage. Of the hybrid several examples ies | 
found, these being recognised by their intermediate character, and the ‘ E 
in which the features of the two species are combined was better made ‘ 
by subsequent detailed comparison. This is the plant known of a 
continent as O. Aschersoniana, and its history is as follows:— . 
ORcHIs ASCHERSONIANA, Hausskn.—The hybrid between 
and O. incarnata was recognised by F. Schultz as long ago 45 1863, W™ et 
was called O. latifolio-incarnata, and was said to be rare in alluvial “_ 
the Rhine valley ; the two parents being also enumerated (Pollichia, ee 
P- 234). Max Schulze afterwards gave some additional localities, but a 
o. latifalt 
when : 
