264 BOTANY [Chap. X 



Letter 594 The point which I wish to examine is really very curious, but 

 it would take too long space to explain. Could you oblige 

 me by taking the great trouble to send me in an old tin 

 canister any of these orchids, permitting me, of course, to 

 repay postage? It would be a great kindness, but perhaps I 

 am unreasonable to make such a request. If you will inform 

 me whether you have leisure so far to oblige me, I would tell 

 you my movements, for on account of my own health and 

 that of my daughter, I shall be on the move for the next two 

 or three weeks. 



I am sure I have much cause to apologise for the liberty 

 which I have taken . . . 



Letter 595 To A. G. More. 



Down, August 3rd, i860. 



I thank you most sincerely for sending me the Epipactis 

 \palustris\ You can hardly imagine what an interesting 

 morning's work you have given me, as the rostellum exhibited 

 a quite new modification of structure. It has been extremely 

 kind of you to take so very much trouble for me. Have you 

 looked at the pollen-masses of the bee-Ophrys ? I do not 

 know whether the Epipactis grows near to your house : if it 

 does, and any object takes you to the place (pray do not for 

 a moment think me so very unreasonable as to ask you to go 

 on purpose), would you be so kind [as] to watch the flowers 

 for a quarter of an hour, and mark whether any insects (and 

 what?) visit these flowers. 



I should suppose they would crawl in by depressing the 

 terminal portion of the labellum ; and that when within the 

 flower this terminal portion would resume its former position ; 

 and lastly, that the insect in crawling out would not depress 

 the labellum, but would crawl out at back of flower. 1 An 



1 The observations of Mr. William Darwin on Epipactis palustris 

 given in the Fertilisation of Orchids, Ed. II., 1877, p. 99, bear on this 

 point. The chief fertilisers are hive-bees, which are too big to crawl into 

 the flower. They cling to the labellum, and by depressing it open up the 

 entrance to the flower. Owing to the elasticity of the labellum and its 

 consequent tendency to spring up when released, the bees, " as they left 

 the flower, seemed to fly rather upwards." This agrees with Darwin's 

 conception of the mechanism of the flower as given in the first edition of 

 the Orchid book, 1862, p. 100, although at that time he imagined that 

 the fertilising insect crawled into the flower. The extreme flexibility and 



