1862] Fertilisation of Orchids. 155 



sions ("Bee Orchis" seemed quite to have taken a back 

 seat). "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 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 the flowers. Trifling 

 as this may appear, I believe important in fertilisation. 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. An insect crawling out of a recently opened flower 

 would, I believe, have portions of the pollen-masses adher- 

 ing to the back or shoulder. I have seen this in Listera. 

 How I should like to watch the Epipactis ! " "P.S. If you 

 should visit the Epipactis again, would you gather a few of 

 the lower flowers which have been opened for some time, 

 and have begun to wither a little, and observe whether 

 pollen is well cleared out of anther-case ? I have been 

 struck with surprise that in nearly all the lower flowers 

 sent by you, though much of the pollen has been removed, 

 yet a good deal is left wasted within the anthers. I ob- 

 served something of this kind in Cephalanthera grandiflora. 

 But I fear that you will think me an intolerable bore." 

 And again, on August gth " In case you visit Epipactis, 

 will you make one other trifling observation for me r . . . 

 Would you try whether irritation, with stalk of grass, on 

 the jointed part or on the orange central part, causes any 

 movement, slow or quick ? . . . The only chance of seeing 

 insects at work would be the first bright day after this 

 miserable weather, or a bright gleam of few hours in 

 middle of one of our gloomy days." 



Unhappily the " miserable weather" of that August 

 continued with scarcely a break. " I concluded that the 

 dreadful weather prevented your visiting Epipactis. I 

 suppose it is now (Sept. 5th) too late, but shall be very 

 much obliged for any observations next year." 



Next year (1861) the correspondence re-opened in the 



