164 THE ORCHID REVIEW. 
green short leaves, and bears enormous branching spikes of flowers. This 
plant is very rare in cultivation, in consequence of collectors not often going 
into that part of the country. I recently saw a plant of this in Sir Trevor 
Lawrence’s collection, the only one I have seen for some time in England. 
A distance of nearly 700 miles separates this variety from the beautiful 
form so well known in our English Orchid collections, Aérides multiflorum 
var. Lobbii (sometimes called A. Lobbii). This is found in perfection from 
Moulmein to Mergui, and is a very distinct variety. The plant is of nice 
habit, with broader leaves than any of the other forms; the foliage is 
frequently, though not always, covered with brownish spots; and the flowers 
are very beautiful, and with large plants very difficult to beat. This plant, 
however, grows so much farther South than any of the other varieties that 
it necessarily rejoices in a much higher temperature, and a temperature 
which would suit the hill varieties would starve this plant. 
There is one more distinct variety which requires notice, in additior. to 
the fine ones above described. This is the form common to most of the 
small islands in the Bay of Bengal: In all the numerous islands I visited I 
found this plant in the greatest abundance, in huge masses hanging down 
from the trees overhanging the sea; these islands being wooded, as a rule, 
down to the water’s edge. This variety is of drooping habit, not erect, the 
leaves are very small, and the flowers miserable, not even equal to those of 
Aérides maculosum of Bombay. Any one collecting this plant out of flower, 
and imagining he had got a good thing, would be very disappointed when 
he discovered what a worthless variety this is. 
Why the island form of this Orchid is so small is a mystery. In no 
place is Aérides multiflorum more abundant than in these islands, and the 
temperature and rainfall are much the same as in the mainland in the 
Same latitude, and yet one good plant of the variety Lobbii is worth a cart- 
load of the island form. : 
An exception should however be made in the case of those islands lying 
close to the mainland in Burma, in these the fine variety Lobbii is found, 
not the small variety. 
(To be continued.) 
ORCHIS PURPUREA, Huds. 
This pretty little British Orchid, frequently known under its later name 
. - a, Jacq., is now only known to grow in the county of Kent, so far 
as Britain is concerned. Three racemes have reached us for determination 
from Miss Ramsbottom, of Waterloo Crescent, Dover, and were gathered 
by the side of a wood in the neighbourhood of that place. It is a pretty 
little species, with dusky sepals and petals, and a four-lobed, pink lip 
Spotted with purple; or occasionally this organ may have a nearly white 
Oe 
