THE ORCHID REVIEW. 207 
BOTANICAL ORCHIDS AT KEW. 
One of the most remarkable Orchids now flowering in the Kew collection 
is the South African Bartholina pectinata, which has the lip broken up into 
seventeen or more radiating linear lobes, lilac-purple in colour. Owing to 
a fancied bl of the lip-segments to the legs of a spider, it has been 
called the Spider Orchid. It is about four inches high, and bears a single 
cordate leaf close to the soil. Masdevallia muscosa is remarkable on 
account of its mossy peduncles, and the habit of the lip closing up suddenly 
when a little tubercle near the base is touched, but gradually opening again 
after a short time. The arrangement is evidently connected with the 
fertilisation of the flower, and its effect would be to temporarily imprison 
an insect which crawled over the tubercle. M. hieroglyphica, M. peristeria, 
M. triaristella, M. demissa, and others are also now flowering. Megaclinium 
minutum is a compact tuft, completely covered with its curious flattened 
racemes ; Spathoglottis ixioides is a dwarf Himalayan species, with pretty 
bright yellow flowers. Cryptochilus sangui is kable for having 
the sepals united into a tube, whose colour is indicated by the specific 
name. 
Maxillaria sanguinea is a very graceful and pretty little plant with a 
bright crimson lip, and flowers very freely when well grown. M. aciantha 
has green flowers with remarkably persistent rigid segments. Among 
Polystachyas may be mentioned P. bulbophylloides, exactly like a small 
Bulbophyllum in habit, P. zambesiaca with yellow-green flowers, and P. 
bracteosa. Cirrhopetalum gracillimum is an elegant little thing with nearly 
crimson flowers, the lateral sepals being very long and narrow. Platyclinis 
is represented by P. abbreviata and P. longifolia, and Pleurothallis by P. 
unistriata, P. rotundifolia. and others. Bifrenaria Charlesworthii is a rare 
Brazilian species with hairy lip; Luisia cantharis has flowers exactly 
resembling a beetle ; and Erycina echinata is a curious Oncidium-like plant 
very seldom seen in cultivation. 
Among Oncidiums may be mentioned O. H 0. phy 
and O. virgulatum ; and among Epidendrums the pretty little E. brac- 
teosum, E. equitans, and E. virgatum. Other interesting things are 
Phalenopsis Esmeralda, Promenza xanthina, Gomeza planifolia, the pretty 
Colax jugosus, Gongora gratulabunda, Pelexia maculata, Catasetum 
Lemosii, S labi longical t and various other Orchids, some of 
which are seldom met with in private collections. 
We are glad to find that more attention is being paid to these so-called 
botanical Orchids. _We know of several collections where more attention is 
being paid to them than was formerly the case, and there are so many which 
are quite as interesting as their more showy brethren, and also as easily 
hell 
