8 



CYRTOPODIUM WILLMOREI. 



new species, we have named it Willmorei, in compliment to John Willmore, Esq., 

 of Oldford, near Birmingham. Our drawing, which represents but a small portion 

 of the panicle, was made from a remarkably fine plant in the rich collection of 

 that gentleman, to whom it was sent in the autumn of 1 834 by Mr, John Henchman, 

 who found it in the valley of Cumanacoa, in the republic of Venezuela. It is a 

 terrestrial species, growing among decayed vegetables, some leaves of which were 

 observed by Mr. Henchman more than six feet long. It has now been in flower 

 nearly six weeks, and has a flowering stem four feet and a half high. It requires 

 a strong moist heat when in a growing state, but during its period of rest should 

 be placed in a more cool and dry atmosphere. 



The plants referred by botanists to the natural order, Orchidacese (the orchis 

 tribe), are among the most remarkable of all vegetable productions. Orchis is the 

 original Greek name of one of these plants, and is at present used to designate a 

 particular genus, which may be regarded as the type of this interesting group. 

 The singularity of their structure ; the curious and fantastic forms assumed by 

 their flowers ; the rich and varied hues displayed by some, and the exquisite 

 fragrance diffused by others, could not fail to excite the early attention of the 

 botanist. In this country they are seen everywhere adorning with their elegant 

 spikes our woods, marshes, and meadows ; though the more rare and curious of 

 the tribe are confined chiefly to chalky districts. Beautiful, however, and 

 interesting as are our British species, yet it is in tropical climates that these 

 plants are beheld in all their glory, where they flourish in countless numbers and 

 in endless variety. A considerable portion of them (the epiphytic class) are found 

 in warm and humid forests, displaying their flowers in all their varieties of form 

 and colour — here sitting in unobtrusive modesty — there arranged in stately 

 panicles — and now in elegantly pendulpus racemes ; attaching themselves by their 

 tortuous roots to the branches of living trees, or clinging to the mouldering trunks 

 of fallen timber ; and thus "adorning the one with bright hues and rich odours 

 foreign to their nature, and rendering the others more beautiful in death than in 

 the full vigour of their existence." (Loud. Enc. PI.) 



Fig. 1, column continuous with the claw of the labellum ; % pollen masses and 

 gland magnified. 



