178 



NATURE 



[Dec. 28, 187^ 



dogmatic, but merely offer tliis as a possible assisting factor in 

 some cases. 



In towering from the second kind of injury, the bird can and 

 sometimes does fly away from the place where it fell, and, after 

 retrieving, concordant testimony shows lesion in the neighbour- 

 hood of the eyes, whence blindness has been assumed to be the 

 cause. The fact that this veiy rarely occurs, perfectly 'agrees 

 with the objection that the smallness of the head is adverse to 

 the theory of cerebral injury being the invariable cause. It has 

 further been noticed that these birds seldom move until they are 

 touched. Whether, attention having been drawn to this subject, 

 future observers will detect a difference in the towering of birds 

 that may, and those that cannot, rise again, is hard to say, but I 

 hope, in the interests of science, all pertinent observations will 

 be communicated and admitted into the columns ot Nature. 



Faringdon, Berks, December 11 J. Hopkins Walters 



The Tasmanians 



I SEE it stated in Nature, vol. xiv. p. 242 (which has just 

 reached us), that M. Castelnau, French Consul at Sydney, states 

 in a letter "to the Geographical Society of Paris, read at its last 

 sitting, that the only four Tasmanians living were presented at 

 the last levee held by the Governor of Tasmania." 



I cannot imagine how M. Castelnau can have allowed himself 

 to propagate such an error. It is quite true that four Tasmanian 

 aborigines were presented at a governor's levee, but the presen- 

 tation occurred just ten years ago, and all the four have long 

 since been gathered to their fathers. 



In reference to the last paragraph in your note, I regret to 

 say that we really "have seen the last of them." The sole sur- 

 vivor of this singular lace, a female, by name Trucanini, died a 

 few months ago at the age of seventy or thereabouts. The 

 "penultimate" aborigine was King Billy, who preceded 

 Trucanini to the grave three years ago. W^. W. SriCEY 



Hobart Town, October 21 



Algoid Swarm-spores 



In a note on algoid swarm spores, published in Nature, 

 vol. XV. p. 15, reference is made to the new investigations of 

 M. Sachy, who considers the motion and accumulation of spore 

 as due to currents produced by differences of temperature in the 

 water, and not at all to the action of the light causing the living 

 swarm- spores to move. I do not know the experiments by 

 which this result has been reached ; but the following seems to 

 me a confirmation of the new theory. 



At a distance of about 5 feet from the window of my room is 

 placed a cylindrical glass vessel of l foot in diameter, and con- 

 taining only some sphagna and microscopical Crustacea. This 

 aquarium has been kept unshaken for four years. 



Now a great quantity of green alga is collected on the side 

 opposite to the window, while the side turned towards the light is 

 covered with a considerable number of little particles of an 

 amorphous matter, arranged in pretty regular cloudy forms, con- 

 taining nothing but dein's of plants or animals, and a few 

 desmidise. 



These particles, which cannot be considered as living matter, 

 arise from the light mud which covers the sand at the bottom of 

 the aquarium. The right and left sides of the vessel remain quite 

 clean. 



I should much like to know if any of your readers have ob- 

 served similar facts. E. Rodier 



29, rue Saubat, Bordeaux, December 17 



Meteor 



I saw the meteor spoken of by your correspondent {ante, 

 p. 170) at Blackwater on Wednesday the 13th inst. at 4.45 p.m. 

 as I was passing down St. James's Square. It was apparently of 

 somewhat greater magnitude than the planet Jupiter, and passed 

 from north to south, till it disappeared behind the houses. 



Your correspondent will find two notices of the same meteor 

 in the Times of the 15th inst. P. L. Sclater 



ON THE RELATION BETWEEN FLOWERS 

 AND INSECTS^ 



'T^ HE habit possessed by our honey-bee of feeding 

 -*■ itself from flowers, and its corresponding faculty of 

 deciding amongst different species and divining the situa- 



• Abstract of an article in the Bienen Zeittmg by Dr. H. Miiller. 



tion of the honey, is, in the first instance, derived from 

 the common parents of all the Hymenoptera. It probably 

 even comes from such remote ancestors as the leaf-cutting 

 wasp, from them passes to the gall-flies, the ichneumons, 

 and the hunting-wasps, from which latter it goes to the 

 allied species of ants and bees. We may see all these 

 families of Hymenoptera feeding on the honey and pollen 

 of flowers, and manifesting a certain, if not always very 

 obvious, intelligence in choosing the flower to be visited. 



The various families of wasps differ amongst each other 

 as to their ingenuity in finding the honey, but it is in the 

 bees that we first arrive at the more complex use of the 

 food, i.e., not merely for the insect itself, but also for its 

 young, combined with such inteUigence in its discovery, 

 as proves that the most highly developed form of insect 

 is the one which profits by the honey lying most con- 

 cealed. The following observations may throw some 

 light on the foregoing statements : — 



I come to the conclusion that the Hymenoptera enu- 

 merated have a certain degree of intelligence, at least 

 with regard to honey that is in sight, from never having 

 seen leaf-cutting wasps or ichneumons, and still less 

 hunting-wasps or bees, seek honey so long in flowers 

 where it does not exist as is the case with some species 

 of beetles, which feed frequently or exclusively on the 

 nourishment derived from flowers. 



However, even very highly-organised insects are at 

 times misled, and Dr. Miiller cites one case in which 

 Melampyrum arvense was surrounded by a crowd of ich- 

 neumons, bees, &c., seeking the honey in vain, the only 

 one which succeeded in obtaining it being Boinbus hor-, 

 torum, which has the longest proboscis of all our humble-i 

 bees. 



It cannot be said either of the. leaf-cutting wasps or of 

 the gall-flies that they attain a high degree of intelli- 

 gence in finding concealed honey, and to these we may 

 add the ichneumons which are frequently found on plants 

 with the honey easily seen (Umbelliferas, Listera, Ruta, 

 &c.), much more rarely on those where it is partially con- 

 cealed (Cruciferos, Spiraea, Salix), and quite as^an excep- 

 tion on those in which it is completely hidden (Gypso- 

 phila, Malva, Mentha.) 



When once a family of Hymenoptera has attained to 

 the point of intelligence of providing food for its young 

 and placing it along with the eggs, we see it develop 

 greater dexterity in its search for honey. In comparing, 

 for instance, the statistics of the visits of the leaf-cutting 

 wasp and the hunting-wasp, we find that even the most 

 developed leaf-cutting wasp only attempts to rob those 

 flowers whose simple form renders the honey easy of 

 access. Even those of Bryonia and Reseda seem unat- 

 tainable by them. On the contrary, we see the hunting- 

 wasps attack not only these, but also flowers specially 

 adapted to the movements of the fossorial Hymenoptera, 

 for example, Echium, the Labiates, and the Papilionacea;, 

 and also the pendent bells of Symphoricarpus, which 

 only allow ingress to the honey from below. It must be 

 deduced from the above statements that flowers and the 

 insects which visit them are adapted to each other, and 

 have gone through corresponding degrees of developraOTJj 

 at each period of the world's history. For example, if i 

 view of the origin of the Hymenoptera is correct, there I 

 been a time when species with an ovipositor were 

 only Hymenoptera ; and when only regular, open, turne 

 up flowers of as low a form as Salix existed, while Resec 

 Echium, the Labiates, the PapilionacCce, &c,, &c., ha 

 been developed at a later period after the species i 

 Hymenoptera had developed to the point of preparing 

 place for their young. 



We may therefore see how through the transition _ 

 hunting-wasps to the habits of bees, and further withil 

 the bee-like family, dexterity in acquiring the food h^ 

 increased. The species perhaps most nearly allied to tb 

 ancestors of the bee — Prosopis— is,asto its organisation 



