32 



THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



erted a certain h\'piiotic influence for good. The practi- 

 tioners soon learned to play upon the credulous. Have 

 they ever now ceased to do so ? Consult an^^ city news- 

 paper for advertisements of quack-medicines, clairvoyance 

 etc, A curious survival of ancient and later medieval 

 study, remains in the so-called "doctrine of signatures." 

 If a plant had kidne^'-shaped leaves it was good for reinic 

 disorders. Pulmonar3^ complaints would be cured b3^ a 

 plant of which the leaves were tubercular ; hemorrhages 

 by a red-juiced plant like blood-root. It is queer to find 

 this notion abiding even now in certain rural districts. 

 Providence, R. I. 



HOW THE NASTURTIUM IS POLLINATED. 



BY WILLARD N. CLUTE. 



IT is not necessary for the botanist to go to distant 

 countries in search of things strange and new in his 

 line; there are plenty still to be found here at home. Take 

 the garden nasturtium {Tropieolum), for instance. This 

 showy member of the geranium tribe, is so common in cul- 

 tivation as to be known to everyone at sight and j'ct, 

 how many could tell whether the blossom is designed for 



cross -pollinfition or the re- 

 verse, and if the first, how it is 

 brought about ? 



In certain families of plants, 

 such as the orchids, mints, fig- 

 worts, etc., the specialized and 

 irregular blossoms indicate at 

 a glance that they have been 

 modified to secure cross-pollin- 

 ation by insects. But it is not 

 every insect that can reach the 

 nectar such flowers secrete. 

 They cateronly to those insects 

 that they can use to advantage and so get their pollen 

 properly transferred with the minimum amount of waste. 

 But the nasturtium blossom is more nearly regular than 



