''DEFENCE, NOT DEFIANCE.'' 119 



old birds and mammals which make such a mistake. 

 When cattle were first conveyed to South America, 

 the Cape, and Australia, many died through eating 

 poisonous herbs. Their descendants, however, have 

 by this time learned which are safe and good to eat 

 and which are not, and those which fall victims are 

 usually young animals. Thus natural selection weeds 

 out the unwary. 



Perhaps it would be found that, in highly-organ- 

 ised plants, those parts which are usually most 

 poisonous are the fruits and seeds. The former is 

 really the "seed -case," and it is, therefore, a higher 

 and completer protection for it to be bitter to the taste 

 or otherwise deterrent, for then animals might proceed 

 no further, and the seeds would be effectually pro- 

 tected. Some seeds, like the Nux-vomica {Strychnos 

 nux-voinica), for instance, have acquired a most viru- 

 lent poisoning power. The Strychnos is a genus 

 remarkable for poisonous secretions. Sometimes, as 

 in Strychnos tieute{di Javanese climbing species), juices 

 are produced poisonous enough for the natives to dip 

 their arrows in. Another species, Strychnos toxifera, 

 (rightly so called), well known as " Wourah," is one 

 of the most frightful poisons in the world. Strychnos 

 cohcbrina, is powerful enough to be an antidote against 

 snake-bites. 



Poisonous fruits and seeds are generally pro- 

 duced at some distance from the earth, and therefore 

 birds are the chief animals which partake of them. 



