FLORA MELITKN'SIS >OVA 123 



foi-ms eapnljle of fertili.sing the ovary being absent. The authors of 

 the Flora, one of whom has lived in Malta all his life, state that they 

 have never seen it in fruit. It appears, however, that recently it has 

 been found at Naples and Palermo with mature seeds, and it has 

 been suggested that possibly after its long isolation, it has acquired 

 the faculty of being fertilised by ]:)ollen of the same form. This has 

 not occurred at Malta, where it has been much longer established, 

 and it would seem more probable that one of the other forms may 

 have been cultivated in gardens at Naples and Palermo, or that it may 

 have been fertilised from some other garden s]:)ecies. A form with 

 double flowers is very abiuidant in Malta and Lampedusa, which 

 furnishes a confirmation of Darwin's theory that sterility is the 

 exciting cause of double flowers. It is curious that such an immense 

 amount of energy should be wasted in the production of useless 

 flowers. One would have thought they would tend to disappear when 

 the method of propagation became purely vegetative, /. e. by the 

 bulbils on the roots. 



Another plant which greatly interested me when I was in Malta 

 has been described as a new species by the authors — Anacamptis 

 Urvillfana. It is shorter and more slender than A. pyramidulis 

 with an ovate never conical spike, of pale rose-coloured flowers, which 

 opens its first flowers as early as Feljruary, whereas pyrrniuJalis does 

 not begin to flower till April in Malta. One day in the Uied Encita I 

 saw a small bee settled on a spike of Uriu'IIeanfi. I watched it for some 

 time, but as it did not move, 1 touched it, and found it was dead. I 

 then removed it, and found to my astonishment that it was lield in 

 jiosition by a pink spider, of exactly the same hue as the flowers, 

 which, alarmed at my interference, released it and retieated amongst 

 the flowers. If my menu)ry serves me right, I found a dead bee on this 

 ])lant on more than one occasion. This would seem to indicate, though 

 not to prove, that this species is sometimes fertilised by bees. If this is 

 the case it would ex])lain Sommier and Galto's statement that though 

 pj/nniiidolis and TJrvilleona .sometimes grow together, no intei"- 

 mediate forms or hybrids have ever been found : for if the former 

 is fertilised by Hymeno])tera, hybrids w^ould not be likely to occur. 

 Otherwise it might be expected, from the facility with which species 

 of the same genus of Orchiilacece hybridise on the shores of the 

 Mediterranean, that two such nearly allied s]5ecies would occasionally 

 cross, in those stations where they grow together. 



'^rhe very remarkable Ophrys Hprcvluui is rare in Malta, but not 

 in (io/o. In 1872 J. F. Duthie noticed only a few s]KH'imeus in 

 the latter island, but two years later he found it common along the 

 whole coast : see his interesting account of " The Botany of the 

 Maltese Islands in 1874,'' pul^lished in this Journal for that year, 

 pp. ;32 1-820 ; 187-"), pp. 36-42. Orchid Huvcata is recorded as being 

 occasionally found with white flowers. Ophrj/a hninhj/lijlora is not 

 rare in Malta, where it grows in dry places; on the Continent it is 

 generally found in moist ground. 



M. J. GODFKRY. 



