Fertilization of Plan's. 143 



and sometimes in a most elaborate manner, the 

 machinery that is needed to perfect the work which 

 the instinct of the animal has commenced. What 

 chance should lead those insects to deposit their 

 {S in the very plants that are so ready to act the 

 part of nurses, and supply by special provision all 

 the wants of the young that come from those eggs ? 

 1 low came the- <-nt kinds to respond 



in these various ways so perfectly to the need of 

 their animal foes? We wonder at the provision 

 which they make for their own young plantlets, we 

 admire their -eneral adaptation to the wants of the 

 animal kingdom as food and purifiers of the air ; hut 

 when \\ .-m building on one unvarying plan 



a dwelling-place for the insert young, and storing it 

 with food, we cannot but recognise a power higher 

 than that of insert or plant the ( 'f both, who 



ordained the laws of their being, who implanted in- 

 stinct in the one, and made the other the willing 



nit of the higher form of \ 



There is a variety of contrivances by which in- 

 sects fertili/e plants. The structure of the flower 

 and that of the often adapted to each other, 



as much as the key to the lock. The honey poured 

 out in the llower attracts the insect, and in his en- 

 deavors to reach the precious fluid he indirectly 

 benefits the plant. We might regard this as a mat- 

 ter of accident were there but a single instance of 

 it, or the same structure for all flowers. But when 

 we see thousands of species of plants of varied 

 forms, with their parts so arranged as to secure fer- 



