112 



ITA RD WICKE'S SCIENCE- G OSSIP. 



another, so that he is actually driven to the course of 

 propagating by slip?, rather than run the risk of 

 producing a pale-coloured seedling. The weakness 

 of the theory is particularly apparent when it is 

 remembered that, in a vast proportion of plants 

 cultivated by this same floriculturist, for either their 

 beauty or utility, the flowers have not evolved their 

 colours through any process of natural selection, 

 but entirely through his artificial methods ; and 

 although many of these are now visited — eagerly 

 sought — by both long- and short-tongued insects, 

 they are many of them in their wild state visited 

 seldom, or not at all, either yielding an infinitesimal 

 quantity of honey, or offering insuperable obstacles 

 to its extraction. Whether or not on the whole 

 insectn more frequently visit certain cultivated plants 

 than they do the wild stocks from whence they have 

 been produced, I am not competent to determine, 

 but I incline to the opinion that they do, since the 

 scent, or colour, or both, having been so greatly 

 improved, it is but reasonable to suppose that so 

 also has been the secretion of honey. 



Nor must we lose sight of the fact, that a host of 

 flowers of every colour yet secrete no honey, and 

 are consequently not now visited by insects, and, we 

 may fairly assume, never have been. To insects, 

 therefore, can in no sense be due their often rich 

 colours. There yet remains to be considered the 

 third alternative, which had nearly been overlooked 

 by me. 



Now if it be argued that the short-tongued bees, 

 &c., continue as they were from the beginning, 

 the theory scarcely needs refutation, since it 

 would be manifestly absurd to suppose that but 

 a comparatively few flowers have been spe- 

 cialised for the benefit of a few long-tongued 

 insects, and that there the process has ceased, 

 that no other changes have been brought about. 

 The least disturbance of Nature's scheme in one 

 particular inevitably involves, in a greater or 

 lesser degree, the disturbance of the whole. 

 The omnivorous but sweet-loving wasps are 

 perhaps the most active, hardy and intelligent 

 of the whole order of Hymenoptera, and yet ii^ '' 

 their lingual implement is of the shortest. Upon ^ 

 ivy blossoms we find myriads of these and other 

 short-tongued flies, both hymenopterous and 

 dipterous, feasting upon the honey which so 

 temptingly lies spread over the whole uncon- 

 cealed disc of the inconspicuous flower. 



Why have both flower and short-tongued 

 insects so long survived unchanged, unspe- 

 cialised, when the process — so say the selectionists 

 — has been and still is in operation ? 



Throughout the whole of this discussion, besides 

 the "taste for blue" theory, the modification and 

 the development of the colours of flowers have 

 been strangely commingled. Consequently I, too, 

 have been inadvertently drawn into the same some- 



what desultory method — that is to say, want of 

 method. I may remind the reader that there is not 

 necessarily any connection between this modification 

 and this development. The modification of already- 

 existing colours in flowers may, in large measure, be 

 due to the unconscious interposition of insects. The 

 so-called development of colours in colourless flowers 

 is practically their creation ; after the initial stage 

 their developme7it follows, and is, according to the 

 theory, dependent upon the intelligence of certain 

 insects. The first is a fortuitous process ; the second 

 has nothing fortuitous about it, but is manifestly a 

 process brought about through the intelligent exercise 

 of the insect's mental faculties, and evidences will, 

 choice, preference, selection. 



So often do the disciples of modern theorists push 

 their theories to conclusions that go far beyond the 

 intention of the original promulgators. 



Edward H. Robertson. 



RAVENS, PEREGRINE FALCONS, AND 

 PUFFINS ON PORTLAND HEAD. 



LAST year (l888) on a cold, snowing, and stormy 

 13th March, I took a raven's nest with six eggs 

 from a large hole in the West Cliff, Portland ; the 

 eggs were highly incubated. The ravens set to work, 

 and, selecting a new spot, built again. I discovered 

 that another collector in Weymouth intended to try 

 for them, by the assistance of some native cliff-men. 



i0M ^ 



I tried to dissuade him, but, as he would not be 

 persuaded, I determined to have a try for them 

 myself again, though I should have preferred to let 

 the birds hatch out a brood. On the afternoon of 

 29th March I went down to the new nest and saw 

 six eggs again, but could not reach them, owing 

 to the cliff overhanging. Whilst I was hanging in ^ 



