OPHRYS (See Encycl.). A new species of this plant has been lately described in the Annual Hampshire Repository, by a Fellow of the Linnean Society, in the following words:
44 Stem—about 12 inches high, erect, stipulate, geniculate,
R r
ciliate, pubescent at the upper genicles. Spike—strictly spiral, flowers spirally ascending, about 24, brightly white. Upper petal ovato acuminate, pubescent, lightly ciliate, straight. Two middle petals oblong-recurved. Two lower petals oblong-acuminate, lightly ciliate only on the lower side near the base, projecting like elephant's tusks. Nectary, broad, recurved, ragged, bicipitate. Leaves floral—carinate acuminate, ciliate reaching and pointing to the middle of the flowers. Leaves radical—five or six, about six inches long, narrow, attenuate both ways, acuminate, the lower more hastate. Leaves cauline—lanceolate, alternate.
“Observation.—This plant has much the habit, as well as autumnal florescence, of Oriental spiralis, and is so perfectly spiral also, that the specific name of the other should be altered, as being no longer exclusively spiral; at the same time that a specific name should be given to this: neither of which (says the author) I shall presume to do, but shall suggest it to the Linnean Society, of which I have the honour to be a Fellow.”—This opium flowered, for the first time, it is believed, in England, in Hampshire, October 1796.