126 The Romance of Wild Flowers 
no doubt, obtain honey without earning it; though 
even such a loss may be prevented by the bearded 
claws making the honey difficult of access except 
from the central rostrum. Lubbock, following 
Sprengel, considers the office of these hairs on the 
petal-claws to be the protection of the honey from 
being weakened by rain; this is probably a correct 
view, but Iam of opinion that their chief purpose is 
to act as a barrier to approach from the circumference 
instead of the centre. 
I need not deal with the distinctions between the 
Meadow Crane’s-bill and the other large-flowered 
species—the Bloody Crane’s-bill (G. sanguineum) 
figured in the title-block to this chapter, with one of 
its stations, Kynance Cove; the Wood Crane’s-bill 
(G. sylvaticum), and Mountain Crane’s-bill (G.perenne) 
—although there are differences sufhcient to warrant 
the systematist in giving them different names, the 
arrangements and movements of stamens and stigmas 
are very similar in each of these. They are all 
perennials, and they have all become so adapted to 
insect-fertilisation by the pollen of other flowers, that 
failing insect-visits they cannot produce seed. But 
there is another group of Crane’s-bills that are annual 
or biennial in duration, and that have small, less- 
widely - spread flowers, and that have evidently 
receded from this absolute dependence upon cross- 
fertilisation. 
The Mountain Crane’s-bill may be regarded as a 
transitional species, showing how these others got 
their smaller flowers and their partial enfranchise- 
ment from insect-thraldom. In this case the stigmas 
ripen and cxpand before the second set of stamens 
