Ill Other Insectivorous Plants 53 



with a growth of fine threads (hyph^e), and absorbs the 

 tissues. 



Legends. — The existence of insectivorous plants was not 

 recognised in days when fancy, ever nimbler than knowledge, 

 was allowed to trespass unrebuked in the domain of science ; 

 yet for that very reason our subject, which affords so many 

 convenient types, shows also how nature -legends arise 

 as of old, by the growing exaggeration and distortion of 

 some real image, as it is reflected from mind to mind. 

 Thus in a well -named medium, the Review of Reviews^ 

 quoting from "Lucifer" (but it appears not verifiably even 

 there), we recently find this traveller's tale and modem 

 myth : " Mr. Dunstan, naturalist, who has recently re- 

 turned from Central America, relates the finding of a 

 singular growth in one of the swamps which surround the 

 great lakes of Nicaragua. He was engaged in hunting for 

 specimens when he heard his dog cry out, as if in agony, 

 from a distance. Running to the spot he found him 

 enveloped in a perfect network of what seemed to be fine 

 rope -like tissue of roots and fibres. The plant or vine 

 seemed composed entirely of bare interlacing stems, re- 

 sembling more than anything else the branches of the 

 weeping willow denuded of its foliage, but of a dark, nearly 

 black hue, and covered with a thick viscid gum which 

 exuded from the pores." Hardly were "the fleshy mus- 

 cular fibres " severed; " the dog's body was blood-stained, 

 while the skin seemed to have been actually sucked or 

 puckered in spots ; " the " twigs curled like living sinuous 

 fingers about Mr. Dunstan's hand " ; " its grasp can only 

 be torn away with loss of skin and even of flesh ; " " as 

 near as Mr. Dunstan could ascertain its power of suction 

 is contained in a number of infinitesimal mouths or Httle 

 suckers, which, ordinarily closed, open for the reception of 

 food." " If the substance be animal, the blood is drawn 



