MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES. 443 



cup-like, and the tentacles will bend over to drink it. Does not this 

 seem very life-like and intelligent? 



Dr. Darwin experimented with one by feeding it with cheese for a 

 long time ; the plant turned a sickly yellow, and died of dyspepsia. 



VENUS FLY-TRAP. 



This is another curious insect-eating plant. At the tip of each leaf 

 there is a trap formed quite like a clam-shell, with two valves hinged 

 at the back and edged all around with sharp thorns. On the inside of 

 the valves are three long hairs, which are very sensitive, and the in- 

 stant they are touched the valves close, the spikes interlock, and the 

 insect is securely trapped. The valves remain closed until the food is 

 digested. 



Then there are the Pitcher plants, very numerous in variety of 

 construction ; big pitchers, little pitchers ; some growing on slender 

 vines creeping on the ground, others air plants, hanging from trees, 

 others with pitchers upright and resting on the ground, half a yard 

 high, tilled with several quarts of pure water for the thirsty traveler.. 

 These are not constructed as traps for insects, but bipds not infre- 

 quently, in quenching their thirst, fall into the reservoir and are drowned 

 The insect-catching pitchers have honey glands to allure, and the inside 

 of the pitcher is lined with delicate hairs pointing downward, so that it 

 is easy for insects to enter, but almost impossible for them to return. 



Travelers have told a wonderful tale about the Tartarian Lamb, a 

 plant that grows on an uncultivated salt plain of vast extent, west of 

 the Volga, resembling a lamb, with a skin covered with a downy sub- 

 stance and head and limbs distinctly formed. It is attached at the navel 

 to a stalk about three feet in height, and it turns about and bends to 

 the herbage around it for food. When this dries up the lamb perishes. 

 This plant is really a species of Fernlibotium barometry. It is said to 

 present a rude appearance of an animal covered with silky hair-like 

 scales, and if cut into is found to have a soft, flesh-colored substance. 

 When through drouth the herbage dries up, this plant, no doubt, per- 

 ishes from the same cause. It is sometimes cultivated in green- 

 houses as a curiosity. — Mrs. M. D. Wellcome, in Farm, Field and Stock- 

 man. 



