TURNING THE TABLES.'' 



267 



The edges of the true leaves are set all round with 

 stiff bristles, which interlock like the fingers of the 

 clasped hands when shut, and if anything happens 

 to be included within them it is held prisoner there. 

 If it should be a particle of meat or a fly it is 

 retained, and subsequently digested by a fluid which 

 oozes forth, and the organic matter is thus assimi- 

 lated. When the blades of the leaf are opened, three 

 stiflish hairs may be seen on each half, standing 

 upright like sentinels; these are highly sensitive (Fig. 





'^%0 



Fig. 96. — Leaf of Venus' Fly-trap ; lower part is a phyllode or flattened 

 leaf-stalk, doing ordinary leaf-duty. 



95 (^). A touch with a hair is sufficient to enable them 

 to commence a series of internal protoplasmic changes 

 of such rapidity that the blades close immediately 

 like a mouse-trap. If an insect alights upon the leaf, 

 and touches these sensitive hairs, it is then captured, 

 strangled, and digested. But it may walk about 

 with safety so long as no part of its body comes into 

 contact with the telegraph instruments, as the hairs 

 might be called. The mucilaginous fluid secreted b5^ 

 the leaves is of an acid nature, and does not take 

 long in dissolving out of the imprisoned dead insects 



