82 WHAT IS A PLANT ? 



nutrient matter of the intruder has been absorbed (a fact easily 

 proved by famiUar experiment), while the harder, non-edible parts 

 are cast aside, and the plant is ready for another meal ! We can 

 try this experiment for ourselves by using minute pieces of cheese, 

 meat, or egg, when similar results will be obtained. If we use 

 bits of china, coal, or stone, the leaf responds slightly, and secretes 

 some fluid, but it rapidly ceases to do so, the articles being not to 

 its taste. Dmicea^ a member of the same order, known as Venus' 

 Fly-trap, possesses leaves formed of two halves connected by a 

 hinge ; on each half are three filaments, while around the edges is 

 a row of long spikes. Let a fly touch one of the filaments ; the 

 two halves close with a snap, the insect is caught, and detained 

 until fully digested by a fluid secreted by the numerous glands on 

 the leafs surface. Here we note that rapidity of action takes the 

 place of viscidity. The Finguicula, or Buttervvort, acts in a 

 similar way to that of Drosera, i.e., by secreting a sticky fluid : 

 and the Laplanders use the leaves of these plants as a strainer 

 for milk, the secretion rendering it soHd. 



Ufriadaria, the Bladdervvort, possesses small bladders attach- 

 ed to its branches ; these bladders, by a delicately-arranged 

 mechanism, form traps for aquatic insects, and even for minute 

 Vertebrata in the shape of tiny fishes.* Whether in this case 

 nutrient matter is digested, or only the products of decay 

 absorbed, we do not at present know. We must not omit to 

 name Nepe?ithes, the Pitcher-plant of tropical Asia, where brilliant 

 colour and attractive odour first lure the victim to its fate at the 

 hollow end of the pitcher formed by the metamorphosed tip of 

 the leaf. Moore, of Dublin, found in one pitcher, 91 ants, 

 16 wasps, 4 flies, i cockroach, 5 earwigs, 7 wood-lice, besides 

 a putrid mass quite beyond recognition ! In Sarraceiiia, the 

 side-saddle flower of N. America, Hooker speaks of the attract- 

 ive, conducting, glandular, and detentive surfaces, words grimly 

 significant of their functions in respect of intruders on their 

 domain. Beside these we have Drosop/iylhim, the Fly-catcher of 

 the Oporto villagers, the African Roi-idula, the Australian Byblis, 

 and others, while some of our own genera, such as Lychnis and 

 Saxifraga, have similar relation towards certain insects. All these 



* Observations on the Bladderwort, G. E. Simms, The Field, June 26, 1884. 



