SHORT CUTS BY BIRDS TO NECTARIES. 389 
layardi, Gurney), white-eyes (Zosterops anderssoni, Shelley), various sunbirds 
(especially Cinnyris kirki, Shelley), and other species. The honey appears 
to be the main attraction, at any rate, to the sunbirds, though the calyces are 
often inhabited by minute beetles and other insects, and these may quite 
likely serve as a strong attraction in themselves. I have several times seen a 
Zosterops draw two or three larvæ in succession from the Leonotis calyces, 
generally perching below and probing all round with its bill (* Ibis, 1908, 
р. 46), but they are also great nectar-eaters, 
The flowers, too, are commonly, but not always, probed by the sunbirds 
(and especially by Cinnyris olivacina) from below, the bird clinging to the 
square, deeply-ribbed, slightly “roughed” stem below the sphere, and 
probing each flower in turn till it has completed the round (cf. * Ibis,’ 1908, 
р. 42). Below verticillasters that have been long in use, the scanty, very 
short tomentum and the normally green outer cuticle sometimes become 
noticeably worn. The single row of flowers that is available at any one time 
is usually, following the growth of the flowering axis, fairly near the lower 
surface of the sphere, and the narrow, vaulted upper lip of each corolla 
projects well out horizontally or somewhat downward, roofing in the anthers 
and surrounding them with a fence of its stiff fringing hairs. The stamens 
and pistil project within it to approximately the same distance as itself—so 
far, that in the practical absence of the withered lower lip it is unlikely that 
the flower would frequently be fertilized by any but a hovering insect such 
as a Sphingid. I have twice, however, watched females of Papilio dardanus, 
Brown, feeding as usual quiveringly on tiptoe, keep brushing the anthers 
with their heads. Hive-bees that I have watched at the flowers’ natural 
openings have not come in contact with the anthers at all, excepting when 
collecting pollen. The flower seems well adapted, however, to pollination by 
sunbirds perching below, and in this case it is the bird’s forehead that does 
the work. The conveniences afforded by the relatively low position of the 
flower, its usually somewhat downward trend, and the absence (shared with 
Erythrina, though brought about differently) of any such obstacle as a 
strongly-marked lower lip to the inward push of the bird’s throat, must all 
help to make the legitimate opening as it usually occurs a sufficiently easy 
one to a bird thus perching below. 
The compactness of the flower-balls of the Leonotis, though probably 
advantageous in relation to birds, apparently lends itself to the purposes of 
ап enemy. А weevil larva (and later, pupa) is often to be found ensconced 
in a large, smooth cavity hollowed out of the heart of the verticillaster and 
entailing the destruction of the bases of a number of the flowers ; it emerges 
in October and November. I have also found ants eating into the bases of 
some of the flowers. 
One other point in connection with the Leonotis may be worth mentioning, 
though it is not strictly within the scope of this paper. It is that it requires 
LINN. JOURN.—BOTANY, VOL. XLIII. 2E 
