(NEW ORCHID.) 
CORYANTHES FIELDINGII Lindl. 
Desceiption. — The flowers are pendulous and inverted, so that the apparatus of 
the column hangs downwards instead of being erect. The general colour of the 
parts is pale brownish-yellow, a little mottled, and stained with cinnamon in an 
irregular manner. When closed the flower is about five inches long, and three 
wide. As it unfolds, the sepals and petals, which are membranous and bear no 
small resemblance to a bat's wings, turn back, seem to fold up, and finally hang 
drooping at the back of the lip and column, in which organs, as is well known, the 
singularity of the genus resides. 
The lip is borne by a thick horizontal arm an inch and a half long, which 
proceeds from the top of the flower-stalk, and consequently from the lower end of 
the column. Eight and left of its base are placed two softish fleshy pale ear-like 
lobes, which are the organs of secretion, a sweet fluid continually dripping from 
them as long as the flower is in vigour. 
At the other end this horizontal arm expands into a convex cap or hood, hairy in 
front, but bald on the crown ; a little compressed from the back, and two inches 
across in its principal diameter. From the cap hangs down a large fleshy goblet, 
smooth at the edges, flattened at the end, two inches deep, and as many wide, and 
connected with the cap by a hollowed fleshy stalk, which is strongly marked by 
various transverse fleshy folds, warts, and ridges ; into this goblet drips the honey, 
secreted by the two ears at the base of the horizontal arm which carries the lip. 
On the side next the column the goblet is opened, and near the bottom of this 
opening it is furnished with three sharp-pointed lobes, of which the lateral curve 
downwards, and the middle one stands erect, rising just high enough to come in 
contact with the head of the column, which grows downwards so far as almost to 
touch it. 
The column is a large fleshy club-shaped body two inches and a half long, and 
throwing back its head, till its bosom becomes so round and large as to be com- 
parable to the breast of a puffer pigeon. The head of the column divides into two 
short, flat, fleshy, curved arms, between which the anther is seated. — Lindl. in 
J own. Hort. Soc. 
