THE WELCOME OF THE FLOWERS 



361 



ants, of a kind (Lasius nigra) which under ordinary circumstances show 

 themselves to be capital climbers, on the flowers of Cyclamen europceum 

 (fig. 441). At first they tried to make their escape downwards by the 

 peduncle ; but as I had put the flower-stalk in water, they turned back and 

 managed to recross the calyx and get back to the corolla. After some 

 useless clambering about the reflexed tips of the petals, they at last reached 

 their curved margins, 

 and here all their skill 

 was baffled, and they fell 

 either into the water or 

 to the ground." 



The calyx, epi-calyx, 

 and bracts may be 

 further protections to 

 the flower, by prevent- 

 ing insects from eating 

 their way through the 

 corolla to the nectary, 

 a burglarious proceeding 

 of which even bees are 

 sometimes guilty. We 

 have seen how admir- 

 ably an inflated calyx 

 effects the same results, 

 holding the would-be 

 intruder at a distance 

 from the honey, even 

 when the tissue has been 

 gnawed through ; and 

 the fact might be en- 

 forced by other exam- 

 ples. Hermann Miiller 

 remarks of one of the 

 Louseworts (Pedicularis Photo W [* s "i>- 



vertidllata) that "the FlG ' 443.-MAB8H CALLA (Calla palustris). 



. The white spatbe serves as an aliglitintr platform for the flies that are attractea 



Calyx IS SWOlien, and by the unpleasant odour to pollinate the flowers. 



the lower part of the 



corolla-tube is bent at right angles within the calyx ; the honey is thus 

 guarded from Bombus mastrucatus, which tries in vain to reach it." In 

 the Canterbury Bell (Campanula medium") the tough inflated hairy calyx, 

 with its valvate divisions, stands above the ovary, the nectar being 

 sufficiently guarded by the expanded bases of the five stamens which 

 surround it (fig. 436 a); while in Clarkia (fig. 4360) the curious boat- 

 shaped gamosepalous calyx, like the curved petals of the Cyclamen referred 



