FREAKS OF PLANT LIFE. 



Dictamnus albus were cultivated, I often repeated 

 the experiment, but always without success, and I 

 already began to doubt the correctness of the observ- 

 ation made by the daughter of Linnaeus, when, 

 during the dry and hot summer of 1857 I repeated 

 the experiment once more, fancying that the warm 

 weather might possibly have exercised a more than 

 ordinary effect upon the plant. I held a lighted 

 match close to an open flower, but again without 

 result ; in bringing, however, the match close to some 

 other blossoms, it approached a nearly faded one, and 

 suddenly was seen a reddish, crackling, strongly 

 shooting flame, which left a powerful aromatic smell, 

 and did not injure the peduncle. Since then I have 

 repeated the experiment during several seasons, and 

 even during wet cold summers ; it has always suc- 

 ceeded, thus clearly proving that it is not influenced 

 by the state of the weather. In doing so I observed 

 the following results, which fully explain the pheno- 

 menon. On the pedicels and peduncles are a number 

 of minute reddish brown glands, secreting etheric oil. 

 These glands are but little developed when the 

 flowers begin to open, and they are fully grown 

 shortly after the blossoms begin to fade, shrivelling 

 up when the fruit begins to form. For this reason 

 the experiment can succeed only at that limited 

 period when the flowers are fading. The radius is 

 uninjured, being too green to take fire, and because 



