262 THE ORCHID REVIEW. (NOVEMBER, 1916. 
E 
HE magnificent group of Epidendrum vitellinum autumnale staged by 
Messrs. Charlesworth & Co. at the R.H.S. meeting held on October 
24th serve to call attention to one of the most effective autumn-blooming 
Orchids, and one whose history is very imperfectly known. It is evidently 
an old plant in gardens, though we have failed to trace its origin. The 
earliest record that we know of dates from November, 1902, when a group 
of three plants from the collection of William Thompson, Esq., Walton 
Grange, Stone, bearing six fine inflorescences each, received a Cultural 
Certificate and a Bronze Medal from the Manchester & North of England 
Orchid Society (O.R., x. p. 368). 
It must have been a plant of very similar character that was noted in 
1884 in the Orchid Album (iii. sub. t. 126). Mr. B. S. Williams there 
remarked that a very fine spike had been received from H. Shaw, Esq., of 
Burton. It was eighteen inches in height, and bore twenty-one orange- 
scarlet flowers of good size and substance, being certainly the best spike 
that had ever come under his notice. Mr. Shaw called it E. vitellinum 
giganteum, and stated that the plant had borne five spikes equally as good 
as the one sent. The note concluded: “There is no doubt that it isa 
gigantic form of the old species, much finer than some of those called 
majus, which generally flower in spring and summer, while this one 
flowers in December, which fact alone makes it a valuable acquisition, as 
we have so few Orchids of this colour blooming at that time of year.” 
The original E. vitellinum giganteum appeared some years earlier 
(Warn. Sel. Orch., iii. t. 27), but is only an exceptionally fine E. vitellinum 
majus, which latter name is cited as synonymous, with three published 
figures, and it is distinctly stated that the flowers are produced during the 
spring and summer months. The latter point was confirmed by Mr. Day, 
who painted E. vitellinum majus in June, 1867 (Orch. Draw., xii. t. 45), 
and remarked: “At last we have the real E. vitellinum majus, after 
repeated disappointments.” He records it as collected in Mexico, on the 
Volcano of Totontepeque, at at elevation of gooo feet, growing on oak 
trees, ‘as recorded by Lindley many years ago,” and finally remarked : 
“It is very different from the common small variety, which comes from 
Guatemala, and always blooms from the young growth before it is nearly 
finished, while majus flowers from the last year’s bulb.” 
This takes us back to the earliest published figure of the species (Bot. 
Reg., 1840, t. 35), where it is remarked of E. vitellinum: “A drie 
specimen in Mr. Lambert’s herbarium conveyed the first knowledge of the 
: 2 
EPIDENDRUM VITELLINUM VAR. AUTUMNALE. ie 
