Note upon Oncidium Lanceanum. 101 



of the stem, evidently intended to grow upon places where the 

 quantity of mould is insufficient to cover them ; they lengthen 

 independently of their growth at the point, like the aerial roots 

 of other Epiphytal Orchideae, and differ from those of other On- 

 cidiums only in being of a greenish yellow colour. The leaves 

 spread from a very short, woody, annulated root-stock, and are 

 about a foot in length on the average ; they are of a broadly oblong 

 figure, of a leathery consistence, are nearly flat, a little curved back 

 at the point, and have a light green colour faintly mottled with 

 purple. The flowers are disposed in a short-branched rigid panicle, 

 elevated on a stalk not quite so long as the longest leaves ; it is 

 about six or nine inches long, and densely covered with flowers, 

 which sometimes assume a corymbose, sometimes a racemose 

 arrangement. The flowers when expanded measure an inch and 

 three quarters from the tip of their back sepal to the point of 

 their lip ; they emit a delicious fragrance resembling that of the 

 garden pink. The sepals are oblong, concave, obtuse, a little waved 

 and greenish yellow at the edge, bright yellow in the middle, and 

 regularly marked with broad blotches of crimson which run together 

 near the base. The two petals are similar to the sepals. The lip is 

 bright violet, darkest at the lower half ; at the base it is prolonged 

 on each side into a triangular tooth, and in the middle of the base 

 there are three nearly equal tubercles which towards the column 

 terminate a ridge that gradually lowers and then disappears at the 

 expanded portion of the lip ; above the base it is narrow, it then 

 expands again into a broad, thin, light purple., somewhat truncated 

 and toothed extremity. The column has an oblique, rounded, 

 earlike appendage on each side, and is capped by a rich crimson 

 anther. 



Such was the specimen from which the annexed drawing was 

 taken ; but it was far inferior to one which I have just seen (June 

 29, 1836), in the rich collection of epiphytes belonging to the 



