98 WONDERS OF PLANT LIFE 



Whortleberry secrete their honey right at the 

 base of the corolla, where it can only be reached 

 by long-tongued insects. Even if a creeping 

 visitor could negotiate the rounded sides, it would 

 not be able to enter the flower, so narrow is the 

 opening. 



Many plants bearing flowers in which the 

 nectaries and pollen are fairly accessible arrange 

 to prevent creeping insects from getting near to 

 the blossoms at all. The stems of not a few 

 plants are densely covered with minute hairs, 

 which render it almost impossible for crawling 

 insects to mount up to the flower. In some 

 instances the hairs all point downwards, and 

 this is to be observed in the case of certain 

 grasses ; if the thumb and finger are moved 

 up the stem a very perceptible roughness may 

 be felt, which is absent when the stem is 

 passed in an opposite direction. In other cases 

 it is not until the visitor actually arrives at the 

 flower that he is confronted with the barrier of 

 hairs. In the case of the common Cornflower the 

 stems and leaves are quite destitute of prickles, 

 but the involucres forming the flower head are 

 bordered with formidable teeth. The lip of the 

 Foxglove is covered with long bristles which 

 guard the entrance to the flower. These do not 



