EPIDENDRUM RADICANS. 
(Rooting Epidendrum.) 
Class. 
GYNANDRIA. 
Order. 
MONANDRIA. 
Natural Order. 
ORCHIDACE^l. 
lengthening. Flowers bright orange-scarlet. Sepals 
and petals lanceolate, acute, spreading. Lip with two 
erect compressed calli at the base, from between 
which an elevated ridge proceeds down the centre, 
three-lobed; lateral lobes broad, rounded, toothletted 
at the margin ; intermediate lobe cuneate, fimbriated, 
and deeply emarginate at the apex, entire on both 
sides. 
Synonyme.— E. rhizophorum. 
Generic Character — Calyx wanting. Corolla with 
five oblong spreading petals. Labellum without a horn 
at the base, tubular, embracing the column, with a 
broad erect plate. Column terete, placed below the 
germen, gibbous. Anthers concave. Capsule oblong, 
three-sided, one-celled, three- valved. Seeds numerous, 
extremely minute, roundish. 
Specific Character.— Stem simple, leafy, throwing 
out a long greenish-white root opposite each leaf. 
Leaves distichous, subcordately ovate, obtuse. Racemes 
This elegant species belongs to that section of Epidendrum named Amphiglot- 
tium, distinguished by (t the long leafy stem with distichous leaves, the want of 
every tendency to form pseudo-bulbs, a terminal peduncle covered with close 
sheaths, and a labellum entirely united to the column." In the recent considera- 
tion of this group, by Dr. Lindley, four species besides the present are included in 
the same division of the sub-section with racemose flowers. Two of these approach 
our subject so narrowly in the general form, jagged edges, and colour of the 
flowers ; in possessing the two tubercular protuberances at the base of the lip, and 
an elevated plate passing between them down the centre ; that the unpractised eye 
might fail to detect their distinctions. 
It is only when we descend to the minutia of botanical points, that the 
dissimilarity of their several parts becomes evident. Dr. Lindley has pointed out 
the following distinctions : — " E. radicans has the lateral lobes of the labellum 
rounded and toothletted only, not lacerated, and it produces coarse pale green roots 
from its stems ; E. cinnabarinum has the lateral lobes of the labellum deeply 
lacerated, while the central lobe is contracted in the middle, and then suddenly 
wedge-shaped, with its angles prolonged into one or two fine teeth. E. Schomburgkii 
has the lateral lobes only toothed, with the centre lobe gradually widened to the 
point, and there toothletted without being at all truncate ; the lobes of the lip 
are confluent in what I take to be a variety of that species/' To these we may 
add, that E. radicans produces a root upon the stem opposite each leaf ; whilst 
VOL. XII. — NO. CXXXIX. U 
