HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 201 



also point in this direction. As the openings leading to the 

 apartments in the leaves are qnite small only minute animals 

 can enter. But what induces them to enter is difficult to say;; 

 they may, perhaps, simply enter to escape to them more appar- 

 ent dangers. 



It has been mentioned that Lathrcea is a parasite. Although 

 such plants will not be discussed as this time we must under- 

 stand, that the principal food of the plant is obtained by suck- 

 ing-cells fastened upon the roots of other plants. The Lathrwa 

 grows only in regions with a long winter, the sucking-cells die 

 during the autumn and are not removed until spring. The food 

 thus obtained is not very different from that obtained by its host, 

 being composed of water with a solution of slight amounts of 

 salts — a fluid we may call " raw food." Since the plant is a sub- 

 terranean one, lacking chlorophyll, and thus not able to obtain 

 from the air carbon dioxyd, it is of great importance to it to ob- 

 tain the necessary nitrogenous substances from dead animals. 

 The supply from its victims, although small, is not so insignifi- 

 cant, because it can be obtained summer and winter, since at the 

 depth in which these plants grow, infusoria and other animals 

 are always active and consequently accessible. 



If it is strange, that a subterranean vegetable parasite with- 

 out chlorophyll can absorb both the raw food from its host, 

 and also self-caught animal food, it is still more strange to find 

 plants, which are enabled to obtain additional food directly from 

 the soil. Such a plant is Bartsia alpina [Fig. 9, (6-8)]. As it 

 would take too long to mention the details of the traps, sections 

 of them are simply illustrated; upon one side of the canals there 

 shown similar glands may be seen as were found in the apart- 

 ments of the Lathraa, and we can not doubt, that the whole ar- 

 rangement is used to catch infusoria. 



CARNIVOROUS PLANTS WHICH PERFORM MOVEMENTS IN CATCH- 

 ING FOOD. 



The Latluera and Bartsia have been mentioned as belonging to 

 the first class of carnivorous plants, which perform no move- 

 ments to catch and digest the animal food caught by them. But 

 both species form the connecting link between those plants- 

 which perform movements of the organs used to catch and digest 

 as soon as these come in contact with the bodies of animals. 

 These various movements depend upon the manner in which the- 

 Vol. IV— 26. 



