41 



M-acoan and Spotton, 1879, page 6. "There are others whose roots 

 penetrate the stems and roots of other plants and thus receive their 

 nourishment, as it were, at second-hand. These al'e parasitic plants. 

 The Dodder, Indian Pi[)e and Beech-drops of Canadian woods are well 

 known examples." There is no doubt as to the meaning of these state- 

 ments. 



I now turn to Wood's Class Book, p. 30, and I find that he classes 

 parasites under three heads, (1) parasites which appropriate stolen 

 juices to their own growth, as the dodder and mistletoe; (2) parasites 

 which, although standing in the soil, are fixed upon foreign roots and 

 thence derive their entire sustenance, "as the beech-drops and other 

 leafless, colorless plants;" (3) those fixed in the soil, like the last, but 

 which derive from foreign roots a part of their sustenance, as the 

 Oeraidia. Wood's parasite is then essentially the parasite of Spotton, 

 Let us now turn to our own particular plant. Of the sub-order Monc- 

 tropa he uses these words: "Low, parasitic herbs;" of M. uniJiorah'Q 

 ays : "common in woods, near the base of trees, on whose roots it is 

 doubtless parasitic." There is no mistaking what Wood says. 



I now tui-n to Gray. Lessons 1877, p. 304:. Of the sub-order 

 Monotropa he says this: "Parasitic on roots, or growing on decompos- 

 ing vegetable matter like a fungus." Turn now t3 his Scructural and 

 Systematic Botany, 1877, p. 4-40, sub-order Monotropese : "Parasitic 

 herbs, destitute of gi-een color and with scales instead of leaves." This 

 can give one idea and one only but at page 91 of the same work occur 

 these words: "It is probable that our Monotropa, or Indian Pipe, a 

 pallid phsenogamous plant, looking like a fungus, actually lives like 

 one, and draws its uourishLient, at least in great part, from the decay- 

 ing leaves among which it grows." In his Botanical Text Book, 6th 

 Ed. 1879, p. 38, he states the case as follows: "Pale or coloured para- 

 sites, such as Beech-drops, Pine-sap, etc , are those whioh are destitute of 

 green herbage, aud are usually of a white, tawny, or reddish hue, in fact 

 of any colour except green. They strike thoir roots or sucker-shaped 

 discs into the bark, mostly that of the root, of other plants, and thence 

 draw tlieir food from the sap already elaborated." In the Botanical 

 Text Book, 1885, p. 338, we find that, "among the higher plants th<re 

 are some . . . which derive all their nourishment from decaying 



