34 WILD FLOWEKS. 



shrivelling than of vegetable irritability, properly 

 so called: in which case, it would evidently result 

 from the too great absorption of the dewy secretion 

 caused by so many adherent bodies. I speak this 

 with diffidence, well knowing how easily error creeps 

 into such observations, and also how very rarely a 

 naturalist will find that the deductions of those 

 who most differ from him are, in reality, less accu- 

 rate than his own, so seldom can individual exami- 

 nation include all possible circumstances and all ac- 

 cidents of time or season. This much, however, I 

 can confidently advance, that when the leaves do, 

 as described, contract, they present a flaccid and 

 decidedly shrivelled appearance ; and that gradu- 

 ally, as a fresh supply of moisture is secreted, they 

 resume their natural position, and the plumper ap- 

 pearance of their somewhat fleshy substance. Yet 

 at the same time we must not lose sight of the fact, 

 that the Droseracece are a pre-eminently irritable 

 family, numbering amongst them, as they do, the 

 celebrated Yenus's fly-trap (Dionaia muscipula), 

 which folds its leaves together if their glandular 

 hairs -be but touched. 



The sundew, or at least the round-leaved species 

 (D. rotundifolia), has another very beautiful pecu- 

 liarity, and one which is full of poetical "suggestive- 

 ness ;" the delicate little flower-buds are racemed, 

 and but one blossom opens at a time that is to say, 

 as the raceme gradually rises, the bud which is at 

 the apex of that portion of it which has become up- 

 right unfolds itself to the sun from which it takes 

 its name ; but if the sun do not shine forth on the 



