2°96 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
thrusts its extensile tongue. I am also informed that a con- 
siderable number of flowers are occasionally fertilised by 
humming-birds in North America; so that there can, I 
think, be little doubt that birds play a much more important 
part in this respect than has hitherto been imagined. It is 
not improbable that in Tropical America, where this family is 
so enormously developed, many flowers will be found to be 
expressly adapted to fertilisation by them, just as so many in 
our own country are specially adapted to the visits of certain 
families or genera of insects. 
It must also be remembered, as Mr. Moseley has suggested 
to me, that a flower which had acquired a brilliant colour to 
attract insects might, on transference to another country, and 
becoming so modified as to be capable of self-fertilisation, 
retain the coloured petals for an indefinite period. Such is 
probably the explanation of the Pelargonium of Kerguelen’s 
Land, which forms masses of bright colour near the shore 
during the flowering season; while most of the other plants 
of the island have colourless flowers, in accordance with the 
almost total absence of winged insects. The presence of 
many large and showy flowers among the indigenous flora of 
St. Helena must be an example of a similar persistence. 
Mr. Melliss, indeed, states it to be “a remarkable peculiarity 
that the indigenous flowers are, with very slight exceptions, 
all perfectly colourless ;” but although this may apply to the 
general aspect of the remains of the indigenous flora, it is 
evidently not the case as regards the species, since the 
interesting plates of Mr. Melliss’s volume show that about 
one-third of the indigenous flowering plants have more or 
less coloured or conspicuous flowers, while several of them 
are exceedingly showy and beautiful. Among these are a 
Lobelia, three Wahlenbergias, several Composite, and espe- 
cially the handsome red flowers of the now almost extinct 
forest-trees, the ebony and redwood—species of Melhania 
(Byttneriacee). We have every reason to believe, however, 
that when St. Helena was covered with luxuriant forests, and 
especially at that remote period when it was much more 
extensive than it is now, it must have supported a certain 
number of indigenous birds and insects, which would have 
aided in the fertilisation of these gaily-coloured flowers. The 
researches of Dr. Hermann Miiller have shown us by what 
