[Plate 7.] 



ODONTOGLOSSUM VEXILLARIUM. 



A Magnificent Stove Epiphyte, unsurpassed in beauty. From New Granada; belonging to the 



Order of Orchids. 



Specific Character. 



ODONTOGLOSSUM VEXILLAKIUM. -Pseudo -bulbs, one and a half to two and a half inches long, narrow, oblong, 

 compressed. Leaves six to twelve inches long, by one and a half broad. Scapes several, sometimes six from one 

 pseudo-bulb, very slender, longer than the leaves. Sheaths small, distant, appressed. Racemes many-flowered ; 

 flowers on slender pedicels ; bracts a quarter of an inch long. Flowers much the largest of the genus ; the largest 

 four inches long ; perianth quite flat ; sepals sub-equal, obovate- oblong, or obovate cuneate, subacute, or truncate, 

 flat, rather recurved, pale rose-coloured ; petals larger or smaller than the sepals, and of the same shape, but 

 usually more acute, of a deep rose-colour, with a lighter margin ; lip quite flat, of one large almost round two- 

 lobed limb, contracted into a claw at the base, and produced there into two ovate acute ascending bracts. There 

 is a small two-lobed callus at the very base of the claw, close to the column, and three small ones at its distal end. 

 The lip is white, suffused with deep rose-colour on the disc of each half, and pale yellow streaked with red on the 

 claw. Column very short. 



Botanical Magazine, 6037. 



A MONGST the many fine Orchids introduced into Europe of late years, there are few, 

 if any, that equal this, if we take into account the immense size and substance of 

 the flowers, their exquisite colour, and the freedom with which they are produced. The 

 individual blooms, from their wide massive character, may be said to be deficient in that 

 elegance which characterises those Orchids that have the petalite and sepalite segments 

 long, narrow, and somewhat elegantly twisted, as found in many others of the family 

 of Odontoglots, of which the recently introduced beautiful O. cirrhosum may be taken as 

 an example ; yet the present plant possesses a beauty of its own. The gracefully curved 

 racemes, having the appearance of almost being weighed down by the weight of their 

 flowers, the labellum of which is conspicuous by its immense size. This Odontoglossum 

 possesses to an extent that most desirable property, in Orchids, of the flowers collectively 

 being fully proportionate in quantity to the size of the plant which produces them — a 

 condition wanting in many; and, however beautiful, when the flowers are small in size, or 

 deficient in numbers proportionate to the size of the plant, it detracts much from the 

 general appearance. The leaves are of a pale-green colour, and it seems to be a remarkably 



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