AND ITS RELATION TO ANIMAL LIFE 145 



way on the animals eating the said fruits or 

 plants. 



As evidence that a chemical change has 

 taken place in some South African pastures, a 

 farmer with whom I was in conversation told 

 me that when he first settled on his farm the 

 natural flowers of the country were violet, 

 blue, red, yellow, etc., but that at the time of 

 speaking (1898) all the flowers had become 

 white, and he mentioned this as evidence that 

 some change had taken place in the soil. 



He had been living on the farm for about 

 thirty years. No doubt the colouring pigment 

 of the flowers had become exhausted, and 

 without asserting that iron was the pigment 

 that was wanting in these flowers, it is quite 

 safe to say iron is the most powerful colouring 

 pigment of the higher plants and animals. 



To show that this changing of the colour in 

 flowers was not of a local nature, in conversa- 

 tion with a lady in the Queenstown district 

 who took a great interest in flowers, she men- 

 tioned she had noticed the roses were much 

 lighter in colour than they had been years 

 before. 



The farmer mentioned lived near Bedford, 



L 



