HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



65 



of rivers drying up in winter. 3. That Unio and 

 Anodonta can save themselves under ordinary circum- 

 stances of falling water, but that the sudden fall of 

 the Ouse was too much for them. 4. That Paludina 

 vivipara lives too deep to be accustomed to a tempera- 

 ture below thirty-two degrees. — Rev. IV. C. Hey. 



Carnivorous Bees. — Mr. Packard, jun., writing 

 in the "American Naturalist," says that an ascle- 

 piadaceous plant was brought to him last September, 

 with several moths hanging dead from the flowers, 

 having been caught by their tongues in one of the 

 opposing edges of the horny contrivances covering 

 the pollinia. A short time afterwards a correspondent 

 sent an account to Mr. Packard about some moths 

 being entrapped in a similar maimer, and around 

 which, as they endeavoured to get away, several bees 

 were buzzing, constantly attacking them with their 

 stings. After they became apparently lifeless, the 

 bees settled on them and began to devour them. 

 The same correspondent had previously noticed the 

 tongues of some moths entrapped in the pollinia, 

 whose bodies had disappeared. The fact was com- 

 municated to Dr. Darwin, who wrote that he had 

 never heard of carnivorous bees, but he suggested it 

 was possible that the bees opened the bodies for the 

 sake of the honey. 



Bulwer's Petrel. — There was a mistake in the 

 identification of the specimen thought to be this very 

 rare bird, to which reference was made in our 

 January number. It turns out to be the black 

 variety of the Pomatorhine Skua. 



BOTANY. 



The "Tourist's Flora."— I am happy to see 

 that J. A. Coventry has the courage to say a word in 

 behalf of the Linnean system ; agreeing, as I do, 

 with Mr. Woods, that it is "almost impossible for a 

 student to determine a plant by the natural orders." 

 Thirty years ago, when I commenced the study of 

 botany, the Linnean system gave me all the aid I 

 needed. It is to be regretted that "The Student's 

 Flora" is not supplemented by a clavis analytica ; a 

 separate publication of it, in which the references 

 were given to the natural order, would be gladly 

 possessed by those in whose floras the key to them is 

 omitted.— T. B. W., Brighton. 



Phyllotaxis.— We are sorry that, owing to a 

 printer's error, the blocks of figs. 16 and 17, illus- 

 trating the article on this subject, were transposed ; 

 16 is that of the ash, and 17 is that of the horse- 

 chestnut. 



Popular Names of Plants and Animals. — 

 Mr. James Britten, F.L.S., of the botanical depart- 

 ment, British Museum, writes to us as follows : I 

 am preparing for the English Dialect Society a 

 dictionary of the popular names of mammals, insects, 



reptiles, and Crustacea, which will, indeed, include all 

 zoological names, except those of fishes and birds, 

 which are in the hands of Mr. T. Satchell and the 

 Rev. C. Swainson respectively. I shall be very glad 

 of help from the readers of Science-Gossip. 



The " Fagus " of the Latins.— In the January 

 number of your very interesting Science-Gossip, is 

 an able article on the "Fagus of the Latins," with 

 which I cannot altogether agree. If we take Virgil 

 for instance, in the line at the commencement of 

 Eel. I. " Tityre tu patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi," 

 he speaks of the fagus as wide-spreading ; a term 

 which could not be applied to Quercus ilex, nor 

 indeed to any of the evergreen oaks, so appropriately 

 as to the beech, of which it is truly characteristic. 

 Again, in Geor. i. 173, " Altaque fagus," the term 

 lofty is applied to that tree, and is certainly much 

 more appropriate to the aspiring as well as wide- 

 spreading beech, than to the round-headed evergreen 

 oak. My son informs me that " Billerbeck, in Flora 

 Classica, considers the Greek pkegos to be Quercus 

 Esculus ; but he makes fagus to be a different tree, 

 namely, Fagus sylvaticus, our beech." — M. Mogp-idge. 



Bees v. Kalmia latifolia. — The Editor of the 

 " Bee-Keeper" answers the query which appeared in 

 Science-Gossip, in his own journal as follows : — 

 " From ' A General System of Botany,' by Le Maout 

 and Decaisne, we learn that the genera (of Ericaceae 

 or Ericineae), Rhododendron, Ledum, Kalmia, and 

 Azalea are narcotic ; the honey extracted from their 

 flowers is extremely poisonous. Lindley (' Vegetable 

 Kingdom ') tells us the same thing, adding that the 

 whole species of the Ericaceae (or Heathwort) tribe is 

 narcotic, and that the leaves are deleterious to the 

 goats, cattle, and sheep which feed upon them. 

 Some writers affirm, however, that the different 

 genera of the Ericaceae are merely astringent, not 

 poisonous. Loudon (' Encyclopaedia of Trees and 

 Shrubs ') says that the leaves of Kalmia latifolia are 

 poisonous to cattle and sheep, but not to deer. The 

 ' Nouveau Dictionnaire Classique d'Histoire Na- 

 turelle' (1845) observes that the leaves are poisonous 

 to horses, kine, and birds, but not to goats or deer. 

 It has been said that the common evergreen shrub 

 Rhododendron ponticum, another species of Ericaceae 

 and closely allied to the Kalmia, was the plant from 

 flowers of which the bees of Pontus collected the 

 honey that produced the extraordinary symptoms of 

 poisoning described as having attacked the Greek 

 soldiers in the famous retreat of the 10,000. Xenophon 

 says that after eating it the men fell stupefied in all 

 directions, so that the camp looked like a battle-field 

 covered with corpses. But the Russian traveller, 

 Pallas, is of opinion that Azalea pontica (again a 

 species of Ericaceae) was the real cause of the mis- 

 chief. Kalmia latifolia, or mountain laurel, is a 

 native of North America, and was introduced into 

 England in 1734. 



