''DEFENCE, NOT DEFIANCE^ 139 



colour of both male and female flowers had success- 

 fully attracted this class of insects, to whom this 

 tint is associated with the animal food they like. 



The trick adopted by the Lords and Ladies {Arum 

 maculatuni) of our hedgerows is worth remarking. II 

 we peel off the neatly-wrapped spathe, we find inside, 

 just at the part where it is constricted, and before 

 it swells out again, a large number of hairs arranged 

 so that insects can easily crawl in, but cannot get 

 out, after the manner that eel-traps are constructed. 

 The tall, purple-co\o\xx^6i spadix rises like a column 

 in the midst, and the flies which have crawled into 

 the trap are kept close prisoners for a day or two 

 until the stamens clustered on the spadix have dis- 

 charged their pollen, and it has fallen down to the 

 bottom and dusted the poor prisoners ! But "poor" 

 it is hardly correct to call them, for they have been 

 well treated in their confinement ; somewhat after 

 the manner voters were kept feasting at the candi- 

 dates' expense, in the " good old times," when con- 

 tested political elections lasted three weeks ! When 

 the pollen of the Arum has been spent, the hairs 

 shrivel, and the imprisoned insects are set at liberty 

 to carry the pollen to another plant, where perhaps 

 the pistils are ready to receive it. How many 

 generations of ancestors of the Common Arum must 

 have passed away before this trick was brought to 

 its present degree of perfection ! Singularly enough, 

 the rarer Birthwort {AristolocJiia clematitis) has ex- 



