DISPERSAL BY ANIMALS 73 
hooks and other clinging organs of fruits and seeds, 
while our dog or our own boots will help us to under- 
stand the very great value of mud in the dispersal of 
seeds: and I may add that the adhesive power of 
mucilaginous seeds enables them to stick not only to 
dead leaves, but also to the fur and feathers of animals 
and birds, and so to get about from place to place at 
their expense. 
In all these cases we should note that the animals 
are unconscious agents, they are not aware of what 
they are doing; but there are others in which they go 
for the fruits quite deliberately, familiar examples 
being the berries that are eaten particularly by birds, 
and acorns beloved by the Jay. Until the seeds are 
ripe, berries are attractive neither in colour nor taste, 
but when they have matured, those of the Hawthorn, 
for instance, are conspicuous from a distance as well 
as soft and tempting. 
At first blush being eaten does not seem to be 
quite the most fortunate thing that could happen to 
the seeds, but they are, nevertheless, too well pro- 
tected by the hard exterior to be ground up by the 
bird’s gizzard and digested, so they are subsequently 
ejected from the body perhaps a long way from the 
place where the berry was produced: they may be 
regurgitated after the meal and then got rid of through 
the mouth, but if they pass through the body vid the 
alimentary canal, and fall to the ground they will 
do so under circumstances obviously favourable for 
germination. 
Beech nuts are also interesting fruits: to see them 
lying in great numbers beneath and around the parent 
tree one might almost exclaim with Keats— 
“‘ And great unerring Nature once seems wrong.” 
