396 DICOTYLEDONS AND CONIFERS 



successfully imported into the country, it was only found where it had 

 been sown, and was not spreading to any great extent, except where 

 carried in hay and straw, and by horses. 



In 1883 J. B. Armstrong stated that a certain proportion of the 

 flowers were self- fertile. There are certainly cases on record of small 

 yields of red clover seed before 1885, but probably the explanation 

 is to be found in another statement made in 1883, also in Canterbury, 

 when R. W. Fereday recorded the fact that the flowers were often 

 fertilised by moths of the Family Noctuidse. Since humble-bees 

 became common, red clover has not only become permanent in 

 pastures, but has spread far and wide throughout the country. (Fl., 

 Nov. to Feb.) 



Mr W. Hone of Waverley (Aug. 1914) says that more than 40 

 years ago, Mr J. Dickie, sen., sowed red clover on a part of his land 

 near Waverley from which he obtained a large crop of very fertile seed. 



Mr W. W. Smith states that hive-bees occasionally fertilise red 

 clover in the shorter flowers of its heads. 



Darwin in a paper printed in the Ann. and Mag. of Nat. History 

 for December, 1858, says: 



In an old number of the Gardener 's Chronicle, an extract is given from a 

 New Zealand newspaper, in which much surprise is expressed that the 

 introduced clover never seeded freely until the hive-bee was introduced. 



I wrote to Mr Swale of Christchurch, in New Zealand, and asked him 

 whether leguminous plants seeded there before the hive-bee was intro- 

 duced ; and he, in the most obliging manner, has sent me a list of 24 plants 

 of this order which seeded abundantly before bees were introduced. And 

 as he states that there is no indigenous bee (perhaps this statement applies 

 to bees resembling hive-, or humble-bees, for some other genera are known 

 to inhabit New Zealand) the fact that these plants seeded freely at first 

 appears quite fatal to my doctrine. But Mr Swale adds that he believes 

 that three species of a wasp-like insect performed the part of bees, before 

 the introduction of the latter; unfortunately he does not expressly state 

 that he has seen them sucking the flower. He further adds a remarkable 

 statement, that there are two or three kinds of grasshoppers which frequent 

 flowers; and he says he has repeatedly watched them "release the stamens 

 from the keel-petal," so that, extraordinary as the fact is, it would appear 

 the grasshoppers, though having a mouth so differently constructed, in 

 New Zealand have to a certain extent the habits of bees. Mr Swale further 

 adds that the garden varieties of the Lupine seed less freely than any other 

 leguminous plants in New Zealand; and he says, "I have for amusement 

 during the summer months released the stamens with a pin ; and a pod of 

 seed has always rewarded me for my trouble, and the adjoining flowers 

 not so served have all proved blind." The case of the lupine in New 

 Zealand not seeding freely now that bees have been introduced may be 

 accounted for by the fact, if I dare trust my memory, that in England this 

 plant is visited by humble-bees, and not by hive-bees. 



