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with translucent spots, and a trail of nec- 

 tar which leads to the dangerous rim.. It 

 has become further elaborated, however, 

 in that the hood extends into a gaudy 

 fish-like appendage, whose colors and 

 flapping serve to attract the flying as well 

 as the creeping insects. The pitcher, also, 

 instead of being straight, is spirally twist- 

 ed, and has a wing-like expansion which 

 serves as a guide in the spiral ascent to 

 the rim, and leads the victim with defin- 

 iteness and certainty to the region of dan- 

 ger. The fish-tail appendage is also 

 smeared with the nectar secretion, so that 

 any flying insect lighting upon it is en- 

 ticed under the overshadowing arch and 

 is almost sure of capture. 



The most common pitcher plants of the 

 tropics are the Nepenthes, one of which 

 is shown in our illustration. It will be 

 noticed that each leaf when fully formed 

 consists of three distinct regions, name- 

 ly, the leaf-like blade, which is continued 

 into a tendtil which coils around a sup- 

 port, and the tendril in turn ends in a cu- 

 riously-formed pitcher, which has a more 

 or less complete lid. These pitchers are 

 often mottled with bright colors, and as 

 they swing at the ends of the tendrils they 

 seem to attract the attention of roving in- 

 sects. Around the rim of the pitcher a 

 very definite row of glands may be ob- 

 served, which secrete the nectar to which 

 the insects are attracted. The arrange- 

 ments within the pitcher are such as have 

 been described for the ordinary pitcher 

 plant. These pitchers of Nepenthes are 

 usually found containing insects, and 

 often very many of them, whose bodies 

 are being slowly digested and the prod- 

 ucts absorbed by the plant. 



Another group of carnivorous plants 

 consists of the sun-dews which grow in 

 swampy regions and are quite common in 

 our sphagnum swamps. While the 

 pitcher plants depend upon luring insects 

 to their death by drowning, the sun-dews 

 depend upon stickiness. The leaves form 

 small rosettes on the ground and are of 

 various shapes. In one of the most com- 

 mon forms the leaf blade is round, and 

 the margin is beset by prominent bris- 

 tle-like hairs, each with a globular gland 

 at its tip. Shorter gland-bearing hairs are 

 scattered over the inner surface of the 



blade. All of these glands secrete a clear 

 sticky fluid which hangs to them in drops 

 like dew-drops, and since these dew- 

 drops are not dispelled by the sun the 

 plants have been called the sun-dews. If 

 a small insect, in flying or creeping across 

 the plant, happens to touch one of the 

 sticky drops it becomes entangled, and 

 then there follows a curious scene. If the 

 insect is small, the single bristle-Hke hair, 

 in whose sticky drop it has become entan- 

 gled, will begin to bend inwards and will 

 finally press the captured insect down up- 

 on the body of the leaf where the short 

 glandular hairs receive it. If the insect 

 is strong enough, however, to escape 

 from a single sticky drop, neighboring 

 hairs will bend toward the one which has 

 captured the insect, and by adding their 

 mite of strength and glue, succeed in de- 

 taining it until they all bend inwards and 

 press it down upon the leaf. In some 

 cases the whole half of a leaf will roll in- 

 wards in this attempt to secure an insect. 

 In this position the captured insect is 

 gradually digested and its nutritive sub- 

 stances absorbed. 



Perhaps the most famous and remark- 

 able of the fly-catching plants is the Ve- 

 nus fly-trap, known only in swamps near 

 Wilmington, North Carolina. This fly- 

 trap does not depend upon drowning the 

 insects, or upon sticking them fast, but 

 upon its quickness of movement. Of 

 course this seems most wonderful in 

 plants, which are not ordinarily endowed 

 with powers of quick motion. Dionaea, 

 for this is the name of the Venus fly-trap, 

 has a cluster of small leaves rising from 

 the marshy ground, just as is the case 

 with pitcher plants and sun-dews. The 

 lower part of the leaf is like any ordinary 

 blade, but above becomes pinched almost 

 in two, and then suddenly flares out again 

 into a round blade-like expansion which 

 is constructed like a steel trap, the two 

 halves snapping together and the mar- 

 ginal bristles interlocking like the teeth 

 of a trap. A few sensitive hair-like feel- 

 ers are developed on the leaf surface, and 

 when one of these is touched by a small 

 flying or hovering insect, the trap snaps 

 shut and the insect is caught. 

 . Many interesting experiments have 

 been performed with Dionaea to show its 



