68 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



the feelers of certain insects. "Each tentacle is capped by a 

 globular disk, which exudes a sticky substance, brightly glist- 

 ening in sunlight. Hence the pretty name of the plant. The 

 scientific name is from the Greek — droseros, dewy — so the 

 naturalist and the mere plantlover both recognize its pecu- 

 liarity. 



Under normal conditions the leaf has a flat or merely 

 depressed surface. If a minute insect alights upon it, very 

 shortly the tentacles nearest him curl over, hold him and exude 

 more secretion. More and more tentacles become involved and 

 the creature is gradually passed to the center of the leaf. The 

 blade then becomes depressed or hollow^ed like a basin. The 

 struggling animal is held tight, and is more and more bathed 

 in a juice now known to be closely comparable to the gastric 

 juice of animals. The intruder is, indeed, with the exception of 

 chitonous or hard parts, like wings or the elytra of beetles, 

 completely assimilated. 



Darwin, who made an exhaustive study of sundew, and 

 whose observations have been confirmed by many others, tried 

 feeding the plant on various substances. It responded to all 

 nitrogenous matters — flesh, cheese, etc. but was inert to pow- 

 dered chalk and the like. With cheese it indulged in an orgy 

 suffered righteously from dyspepsia, withered and died. 



In the United States besides the round-leaved, we ha\ e 

 other species. In Rhode Island there are two, and there is n(T 

 sufficient reasons why another, the red-flowered D. Uliformis 

 with long thread-like leaves tentacled throughout their length, 

 should not yet turn up in South Co. or in Little Compton. It 

 occurs on the Cape, so near us and under our own sort of en- 

 vironment, that one might fairly expect it. 



Providence, R. I. 



