33 6 BOTANY [Chap. XI 



Letter 66 1 Down, June 2nd, 1863. 



It would give me real pleasure to resolve your doubts, but 

 I cannot. I can give only suspicions and my grounds for 

 them. I should think the non-viscidity of the stigmatic 

 hollow was due to the plant not living under its natural 

 conditions. Please see what I have said on Acropera. An 

 excellent observer, Mr. J. Scott, of the Botanical Gardens, 

 Edinburgh, finds all that I say accurate, but nothing daunted, 

 he with the knife enlarged the orifice and forced in pollen- 

 masses ; or he simply stuck them into the contracted orifice 

 without coming into contact with the stigmatic surface, which 

 is hardly at all viscid, when, lo and behold, pollen-tubes were 

 emitted and fine seed capsules obtained. This was effected 

 with Acropera Loddigesii ; but I have no doubt that I have 

 blundered badly about A. luteola. I mention all this because, 

 as Mr. Scott remarks, as the plant is in our hot-houses, it is 

 quite incredible it ever could be fertilised in its native land. 

 The whole case is an utter enigma to me. Probably you are 

 aware that there are cases (and it is one of the oddest facts 

 in Physiology) of plants which, under culture, have their 

 sexual functions in so strange a condition, that though their 

 pollen and ovules are in a sound state and can fertilise and be 

 fertilised by distinct but allied species, they cannot fertilise 

 themselves. Now, Mr. Scott has found this the case with 

 certain orchids, which again shows sexual disturbance. He 

 had read a paper at the Botanical Society of Edinburgh, and 



and narrow religious creed, and though, as Edmund Gosse points out 

 (p. 336), there was in his father's case no reconcilement of science and 

 religion, since his " impressions of nature " had to give way absolutely to 

 his " convictions of religion," yet he was not debarred by his views from 

 a friendly intercourse with Darwin. He did much to spread a love of 

 Natural History, more especially by his seaside books, and by his intro- 

 duction of the aquarium — the popularity of which (as Mr. Edmund Gosse 

 shows) is reflected in the pages of Punch, especially in John Leech's 

 illustrations. Kingsley said of him (quoted by Edmund Gosse, p. 344), 

 " Since White's History of Selborne few or no writers on Natural History, 

 save Mr. Gosse and poor Mr. Edward Forbes, have had the power of 

 bringing out the human side of science, and giving to seemingly dry 

 disquisitions . . . that living and personal interest, to bestow which is 

 generally the special function of the poet." Among his books are the 

 Naturalist's Sojourn in Jamaica, 185 1 ; A Naturalist's Rambles on the 

 Devonshire Coast, 1853 ; Omphalos, 1857 ; A Year at the Shore, 1865. 

 He was also author of a long series of papers in scientific journals. 



