' AUGUST, IgI0.] THE’ ORCHID REVIEW. 237 
THE GENUS SARCOPODIUM. 
THE Orchids now included in Dendrobium section Sarcopodium form a 
very distinct group, and objection has several times been taken to their 
inclusion in Dendrobium, on account of their very distinct habit and the 
different appearance of the flowers. Reichenbach included them in Bulbo- 
phyllum (Walp. Ann., vi. p. 244), but this position is equally unsatisfactory 
Dr. Lindley’s view was that they constitute a distinct genus, to which he 
gave the name of Sarcopodium, in 1850 (Paxt. Fl. Gard., i. p. 154). He 
remarked : ‘* Between Dendrobes and Bulbophyls there exists a race having 
the large flowers of the former and the peculiar habit of the latter, and 
hence referred to the one or the other genus according to the fancy of the 
observer. They agree with Dendrobes in having four pollen masses and a 
hornless column, but they have ° coriaceous, not thin half-transparent 
flowers, and a tough leathery lip, enlarged, not contracted at the base. If 
they had a caudicle and gland to their pollen masses they would be Asiatic 
Maxillarias. They form neither horn nor spur, but are simply inflated and 
expanded at the base of the sepals. On the other hand, although they 
grow like Bulbophyls, yet they have no horns to their column, but two 
pollen masses, and their large leathery flowers afford a further difference. 
To these plants, consisting of the Dendrobium amplum, of Wallich, and 
the Bulbophyllum Lobbii, affine, leopardinum, Cheiri and macranthum of 
Lindley, the name Sarcopodium may be applied.” The second of these 
was figured, under the name of Sarcopodium Lobbii (fig. 98). 
Soon afterwards, in the Folia Orchidacea, Lindley published a fuller 
account of the genus, in which he included sixteen species, dividing them 
into two sections, the first having a concave, trilamellate lip, and containing 
four species, the latter a canaliculate, unappendaged lip, and twelve species. 
The two sections are really very distinct, and in the Genera Plantarum the 
the first is referred to Dendrobium, as section Sarcopodium, and the second 
to Bulbophyllum, as section Sestochilos. The former I have long thought 
could be better considered as a distinct genus, to which the name Sarco- 
podium can be properly applied, although it contains only the first of the 
six species originally enumerated by Lindley. It cannot be applied to the 
second section, for S. Lobbii, of which a figure was given, had long 
previously been figured and described by Breda, under the name of 
Sestochilos uniflorum (Gen. et Sp. Orch. Jav. t. 3), a fact overlooked by 
Lindley when describing Sarcopodium. 
The genus, as thus limited, has a more or less elongated, woody rhizome, 
with ovoid or somewhat tetragonal pseudobulbs, bearing two, oblong, 
coriaceous leaves at the apex, and a terminal inflorescence of one to several 
flowers. The sepals and petals are oblong or acuminate ; the lip three-lobed, 
