142 SAGACITY AND MORALITY OF PLANTS. 



" lime," in which the greedy ants are sure to be caught 

 and killed. The order CaryophyllacecB has been the 

 most successful in developing this device. Many 

 species go by such popular names of " Catchflies," 

 on account of numberless insects having been seen 

 adhering to their sticky stems. Kerner gives a long 

 list of viscid -stemmed and calyxed plants. How 

 effectively this method defends them from entomo- 

 logical depredators is proved by his counting sixty- 

 four small insects sticking to a single inflorescence of 

 Lychnis viscaria. In the Gschnitz Valley, Tyrol, he 

 tells us he collected over sixty species from the viscid 

 flower-stems of Silene nutans alone, of which a large 

 number were ants. Suffice it for us, however, that 

 the reason for the secretion of these sticky fluids by 

 plants is a defensive one ; just as the secretions of 

 poison, tannin, and bitter principles are now known 

 to be. 



I cannot forego mentioning a special example, 

 indicative of what would be regarded as sagacity 

 of the acutest kind if it had been exhibited by 

 an animal. One of our commonest British plants is 

 the Amphibious Persicaria [Polygomcin amphibinni), 

 which grows, as its botanical specific name indicates, 

 as well on the dry land as in water. All the 

 specimens growing on land possess sticky glands, 

 whose exudations protect the flowers from crawling 

 insects. But when it grows in water no viscid 

 secretion is elaborated — as if the plant were con- 



