Fepruary, 1906.] THE ORCHID REVIEW. 61 
apex, thus most resembling the seed parent. The seed was sown in 
October, 1897. The preceding were all raised in the collection. 
A brightly-coloured Lzlio-cattleya, purchased as L.-c. X Pallas, is also- 
sent, but we should suggest that it may be a form of L.-c. X Gottoiana, or 
one of the allied L. tenebrosa hybrids. 
ae 
ODONTOGLOSSUM PLATYCHILUM. 
THE mystery about this handsome Odontoglossum is at last cleared up. 
It appeared at a meeting of the R.H.S. on March 22nd, 1892, and was. 
thus recorded :—“ R. I. Measures, Esq., Cambridge Lodge, Camberwell 
(gr. Mr. H. Simpkins), sent a curious and pretty supposed new species of 
Odontoglossum with white flowers, the lip handsomely marked with bright 
rose.” (Gard. Chron., 1893, i., p. 408). Mr. Simpkins wrote :—‘‘ The 
Orchid Committee at the Drill Hall yesterday gave me an Award of Merit 
for an Odontoglossum sp. unknown, and desired me to bring or send the | 
plant to Kew for you to decide a name for it, if new or otherwise. The 
plant has only two bulbs with leaves, and two flowers on the spike.” The 
plant was afterwards brought down, and I could find nothing like it, hence 
the name O. platychilum was proposed. Nothing was known of its origin 
except that it was purchased by Mr. Measures out of an odd lot when the 
Downside collection was sold. Thus it had been in cultivation five or six 
years at least before it flowered. In describing it, I suggested that it 
appeared to be most allied to the Guatemalan O. stellatum, Lindl., and 
evidently belonged to the Central American group of species (Gard. Chron., 
1892, ii., p. 35). Previous to this, however, a figure and description by 
Mr. J. Weathers had appeared (/.c., i., p. 587, fig. 84). Upwards of thirteen 
years elapsed without further information respecting the species, when I 
recognised it among some undetermined Central American Orchids in the 
collection of Oakes Ames, Esq., in a collection distributed by J. Donnell 
Smith. It was collected by Heyde and Lux, at Chiul, in the Department 
of Quiché, Guatemala, at an altitude of 2,600 métres, in April, 1892. This 
specimen proved identical with a fruiting specimen collected by Bernoulli 
in Guatemala in May, 1866, which had previously been indeterminable 
(Odontoglossum sp., Hemsl. Biol. Centr. Amer., Bot., iii., p. 278). It is 
interesting to be able thus to clear up the history of the species, but I fear 
it is now lost to cultivation, nothing having been heard of it for a consider- 
able period. It isa beautiful species, and remarkable for its broad white 
lip being regularly spotted with purple, while the sepals and petals are also- 
white. It would be interesting if someone could secure an importation of 
the species. 
R. A. ROLFE. 
