CHAP. VII. 
SINGULAR LOCALITIES OF ANGRvECUMS. 
77 
this island and those with which I had been familiar in the 
South Seas, consisted in the Madagascar plants exhibiting a 
more robust habit of growth, and rather larger, as well as more 
darkly-tinted flowers. In all other respects the plants appeared 
identical. 
Orchids were abundant, and often occupied positions in 
which the growers of these plants in England would little 
expect to find them, but in which they gave an indescribable 
singularity and charm to the landscape. The limodorums 
were numerous in parts of the road, and formed quite a ball 
of interlaced roots at the base of the bulbs. A small species, 
resembling in habit and growth the Camarotis purpurea , 
but quite unknown to me, and bearing a vast profusion of 
white and sulphur-tinted flowers, often enlivened the sides 
of the road along which we passed. But the angraecums both 
A. superhum and A. sesquipedale , were the most abundant 
and beautiful. I noticed that they grew most plentifully on 
trees of thinnest foliage, and that the A. sesquipedale was 
seldom, if ever, seen on the ground, but grew high up 
amongst the branches, often throwing out long straggling 
stems terminating in a few small, and often apparently 
shrivelled, leaves. The roots also partook of the same habit. 
They were seldom branched or spreading, but long, tough, 
and single, sometimes running down the branch or trunk of 
a tree, between the fissures in the rough bark, to the length 
of twelve or fifteen feet; and so tough and tenacious that it 
required considerable force to detach or break them. Many of 
these plants were in flower; and, notwithstanding the small, 
shrivelled appearance of the leaves, the flowers were large, 
and the yellow colour strongly marked. On more than one 
occasion I saw a splendid Angrcecum sesquipedale growing 
on the trunk of a decaying or fallen tree, as shown in the 
accompanying engraving, and sending its tough roots down 
the trunk to the moist parts of the vegetation on the ground. 
N 
