I42 ROUND THE YEAR 



MIDSUMMER BLOOMS. 



One of the glories of the summer is the abundance 

 of white flowers, not merely scattered about the lawns 

 and hedges like stars, but clustered into sheets and 

 masses. Hawthorn, Elder, Meadow-sweet, the great 

 Umbellifers, Apple, Pear, Bird-cherry, Mountain Ash, 

 Horse Chestnut and Guelder Rose are familiar 

 instances. The spectacle opens in May, and ends in 

 August with the great Wood Campanulas. As the 

 autumnal equinox draws near, the twilight is too 

 short and the nocturnal Insects too few for flowers of 

 this particular kind. 



It seems probable on a first consideration of the 

 question that these expanses of white flowers, 

 glimmering in the twilight of the short night of 

 Midsummer, are lures to night-flying Insects. Some 

 of them offer fragrance as well as contrast of colour, 

 and the fragrance is often more powerful by night. 

 But when we come to note what Insects have been 

 actually seen to visit the great white blooms, we shall 

 find that some of them are visited only in the day^ 

 time, and by various kinds of Flies. The Umbelliferae 

 are adapted for fertilisation by Flies, and their odours, 

 often disagreeable and rank to our taste, seem to be 

 well suited to the appetite of Flies. The night- 

 haunted blooms on the other hand are largely visited 

 by Moths, and belong more particularly to the season 

 when Moths are plentiful. Moths, it would seem, 

 enjoy the same odours as ourselves, for many of the 

 perfumes which attract Moths delight mankind also. 



