XXXVlii PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Cyclamen with branching inflorescence. — Mr. Hawkes, of Osterley 

 Park Gardens, sent shoots of Cyclamen bearing leaves springing from 

 the peduncles, and in their axils other flowers. These branching 

 peduncles of Cyclamen appear not uncommon in collections where 

 the plants are growing with unusual vigour. 



Gall on root of Thuya. — A large globular growth the size of a cricket 

 ball was shown on the root of a Thuya. It was very similar in appear- 

 ance and structure to those not uncommon on the roots of Logan- 

 berries and other plants, and was possibly allied to the crown-gall 

 which attacks so many widely different plants. 



Scientific Committee, January 21, 1913. 



Mr. E. A. Bowles, M.A., F.L.S., F.E.S., in the Chair, and ten members 



present. 



Dendrobium fuscescens. — Mr. O'Brien, V.M.H., showed a specimen 

 of this curious species with brown flowers from the Himalayan region. 

 It is figured in Griffiths' Icon. Plant. Asiat. t. cccix., and belongs 

 to the section included by Lindley in his genus Sarcopodium (see 

 Lindley's Folia Orchidarum), along with D. Coelogyne, D. amplum, 

 and D. rotunda-turn. Lindley considered the genus Sarcopodium 

 intermediate between Dendrobium and Bulbophyllum, but later botanists 

 have divided it, putting some of the species in Bulbophyllum and some 

 in Dendrobium. It may be noted that the technical descriptions 

 published of the species describe two orange spots on the column, but 

 there are really three, one of them being quite low down. 



Apples with many or no pips. — Mr. F. J. Chittenden showed 

 specimens of the Apples, to which he had previously referred, having 

 more than two seeds in the carpellary cavities. The variety ' Duchess' 

 Favourite ' had, as a rule, in the past season four seeds in each cell, 

 and in one case five had been found. This is remarkable, as the 

 number in the wild types is practically constantly two, a fact which 

 has been used as a basis for the separation of the genera Pyrus and 

 Cydonia. Like many other points of distinction between species 

 and even genera, this would appear not to be absolute. He also showed 

 specimens of an Apple sent him by Mr. P. C. M. Veitch, of Exeter, 

 called ' No-Pip,' which was reputed to form no seeds, although the 

 Apple was perfectly developed. Those exhibited had only the merest 

 rudiments of seeds. 



Galls on Polypodium sp. from the Gold Coast. — Mr. W. H. Patterson 

 sent specimens of the fronds of a Polypodium galled along the edges 

 of the pinnae, and somewhat crested through the attacks of a species 

 of Eriophyes. Mites belonging to this genus are well known as exciting 

 the development of galls on all sorts of plants, and one, E. pteridis, 

 and another, unnamed, are described as causing galls on the margins 

 of fronds of Pteris aquilina in South Europe. Mr. Patterson finds the 

 mite to spread but slowly among Ferns at Aburi. 



