Cuckoo-Pint, 261 



a gilded public-house. Once more they crawl down 

 the funnel-shaped tube ; once more they pass the eel- 

 pot hairs ; and once more they rub off the pollen that 

 clings to their legs and sides upon the sensitive surfaces 

 of the lower flowers. For a while they have again to 

 fast in their narrow prison ; and then the stamens 

 of the second arum open their pollen-sacs, and dust 

 the greedy insects a second or third time with golden 

 grains. So, throughout the whole flowering season of 

 the arums, these little flies go about from head to 

 head in constant relays, unconsciously benefiting the 

 plant, while they are effecting theirown hungry purpose 

 in eating up the spare pollen. From the point of view 

 of the insects, the only use of arums is to produce 

 food and shelter for wandering flies ; but from the 

 point of view of the plant, the only use of insects is 

 to act as common carriers for the conveyance of pollen 

 from one head to another. Man, however, is far wiser 

 and more expansive in his ideas about the economy 

 of nature than either : according to him, the real, 

 final end of all this beautiful and marvellous me- 

 chanism is to produce Portland arrowroot for starch- 

 ing his own civilised shirt-fronts, wristbands, and 

 collars. 



After the dissolute small flies have performed their 

 function in the economy of the cuckoo-pint by thus 



