1902-1903.] Anfs in Relation to Flowers. 19 



111 the case of other plants, they have opened their bazaars 

 in the evening ; and as brightly-coloured flags don't show up 

 well in the dusk, wild-flowers of this kind put out white ones, 

 and make up the effect by using strong sweet scents. In 

 either case the result attained is the same. 



Now all that amount of trouble and expense cannot be 

 incurred by the plant without some adequate return. It 

 wouldn't pay in the case of a bazaar to let in a number of 

 dirty little boys, who would carry off the sweets without 

 paying a copper in the shape of either entrance-money or the 

 price of the goods. So, as I said, these have to be kept out 

 by every possible means. In Kerner's ' Flowers and their 

 Unbidden Guests,' one of the most delightful books on Botany 

 any one can read, there are admirable accounts of a great 

 many of the devices employed by plants with the express 

 object of keeping away undesirable visitors who rifle the 

 honey and do the plant no good in return. I must refer the 

 reader to this book for a fuller account of the subject than is 

 given anywhere else. 



The general nature of those devices which have for their 

 object the protection of flowers from the visits of undesirable 

 guests cannot be dealt with in an Address a few pages in 

 length like this, and especially without illustrations. A 

 large number of them were shown by means of lantern-slides 

 on the occasion above referred to. They comprise almost 

 every possible arrangement of bristles, hairs, and spikes, some 

 quite dry, many of them sticky with some viscous bird-lime 

 kind of secretion. Nobody studying these could have very 

 much doubt that the plant has had Ants in mind in using 

 these various contrivances for preventing the ingress of small 

 insects to the chamber containing the honey meant for the 

 Bees. Then plants seem long ago to have found out the 

 device that gardeners are wont to use when they are troubled 

 with Ants in their conservatories. The gardener puts the 

 flower- pot in a saucer of water, which no Ant dare attempt 

 to swim. Many plants with opposite leaves connate at their 

 base hold up a little pool of water, which, whether meant 

 wholly for the purpose of excluding Ants or not, yet most 

 effectually answers that purpose. Gardeners in some other 

 cases prevent troublesome animals from climbing their trees 



