300 THE ORCHID REVIEW. 
thum? (lc., p. 54). At all events, O. macranthum var. hastiferum was 
shortly afterwards figured in the Floral Magazine (1868, t. 386), and again 
in the Gardeners’ Chronicle as O. macranthum (1869, p. 739, with fig.), with 
the note that it was distributed under the name of O. macranthum 
hastiferum, being then identified with O. hastiferum, Rchb. f., from which, 
however, it seemed to differ. 
In 1871 Reichenbach wrote respecting O. macranthum hastiferum :— 
“The unfortunate name of hastiferum was given, if I remember right, to 
the best variety. It gave rise to the suspicion that my ‘hastiferam’ was 
the same plant, though that is quite as distinct from hastiferum as a 
rhinoceros from a hippotamus, since it has an erect blade on its anterior 
lip . There is scarcely any doubt that the hastiferum is what 
was Lae intended for macranthum, which was gathered by Ruiz and 
Pavon” (Gard. Chron., 1871, p. 1129). How far these remarks are correct 
can only be certainly ascertained when Reichenbach’s Herbarium is 
opened, some fifteen years hence. It is true that he sent to Lindley a 
rude sketch of a single flower which agrees with nothing that I have seen, 
not even with a flower from Warscewicz himself, which otherwise I should 
have taken as true O. hastiferum, Rchb.f. It is also recorded that Mr. 
Skinner ‘“‘ had, at some former time, received O. macranthum in quantity 
from that enterprising collector, Warscewicz,” which he considered 
different from the plants sold by M. Linden (Gard. Chron., 1866, p. 1245). 
My own impression is that the rude sketch above alluded to is incorrect in 
detail, and that the flower from Warscewicz represents O. hastiferum, 
Rchb. f.,and the more so as this agrees with a plant which has just 
flowered in the collection of the Right Hon. J. Chamberlain, M.P., at 
Highbury, which is not quite the ordinary O. macranthum known in 
gardens, though apparently a form of it—at all events the dried specimens 
have hitherto been so considered. 
Living flowers of O. macranthum are not now available for comparison, 
or it would be easier to say whether the differences observed may not be 
attributable to the variation of a single species, as I am inclined to think. 
It seems almost incredible what an amount of confusion has been intro- 
duced into the history of O. macranthum. To the present day the habitat 
is given as ‘‘ New Grenada” in Williams’ Manual, and Messrs. Veitch 
remark :—The first notice of it as a horticultural plant occurs in the horti- 
cultural journals in 1868, in the spring of which year it flowered for the first 
time in this country, in the collection of Lord Londesborough, at Norbiton, 
and shortly afterwards at Farnham Castle, and in our Chelsea nursery. No 
indication is given of the origin of these plants, which were doubtless all 
imported at the same time” (Man. Orch. viii., p. 59.). The fact is, that 
during the two previous years (1866-7), at feiss eight different communica- 
